


Godless

by Turtle_ier



Series: Turtle's MCYT AUs [20]
Category: Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Abandonment, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Western, Angst, Bandits & Outlaws, Bathing/Washing, Brokeback mountain vibes, Cowboys & Cowgirls, Drama, Dream isn't a nice person in this one, Eventual Romance, Flashbacks, George is a horsegirl, Gun Violence, Horses, Illnesses, Injury Recovery, Kissing, M/M, Minor Violence, Slow Burn, schlatt is a corrupt sheriff but it suits him ok
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-02
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-15 10:47:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 23,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29807253
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Turtle_ier/pseuds/Turtle_ier
Summary: The Calaway Desert is known for few things - sand, outlaws, and cacti. But when George is lost out in her red land, only a horse, a gun and an inaccurate map to his name, he discovers a miner living out in the north-west canyons. He only intends to stay long enough to get some water before moving on, but something, be it bad luck, the weather or circumstance, keeps bringing him back to the strange man out in Calaway.
Relationships: GeorgeNotFound/Sapnap (Video Blogging RPF)
Series: Turtle's MCYT AUs [20]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1875367
Comments: 33
Kudos: 79





	1. Chapter 1

Over the high skies of the Calaway Desert, a single vulture flew. 

Its wings were motionless as it slid across the cerulean sky, like a rock skimming the surface of an oasis pond, and the orange landscape below it welcomed, if only temporarily, the shade the bird provided. Its black shape moved from east to west, across the rocky formations of north Arizona and onwards over canyons and railways, until it found a lonely saguaro to stand on and watch the two-forty-nine train east pass it by. The vulture didn't seem to notice or care about the horse and its two passengers riding alongside it.

Hooves smacked the hard clay, kicking up dust and gravel as the horse panted, running full pelt with one of its riders, a cock-sure blonde, standing on her saddle. The other, wearing a Stetson hat and a leather vest, along with a bandana across his mouth, guided the horse as the train turned gradually, eventually right. 

“Come on,” the one in the hat shouted, “Get a grip!”

“I’m trying!”

“Hurry up!” 

The horse’s gallop didn't sway, but the train picked up speed. The breathing changed as the flat ground beside the tracks turned into shrubs – small, grassy things that whipped at the rider’s legs as they struggled to catch up. The lowland was reaching its end, and in the bright orange rock ahead a tunnel lay in wait. The rider kicked the horse as it brayed, lowering her head along with her rider to pick up speed, and the blonde’s legs left the saddle of the horse. For a moment, there was only the struggle as the blonde pulled himself into the coal waggon of the train, and the rider raised his hand to the sky, to the blonde. But as the horse struggled and sweated beside the train, and the train gained speed when its front end entered the dark tunnel, no hand came.

“Dream!” The rider shouted, “Dream, this isn't funny, help me up!”

But the blonde only poked his head from the cart, smiling down at the rider. 

“I’ll see you in Gospel if you make it, George!”

“Help me up!”

But the horse screamed as the cliff face came too close, and her hooves dug into the hard clay beneath them. As the rider shouted at the blonde, whose pale face dipped beneath the coal waggon in the train, the horse came to a grinding, painful stop. The train, uncaring, passed him by. 

Panting in the hot desert air, George watched where the train had disappeared into the tunnel, his exhausted horse breathing, panting, with her mouth hanging open, too. He adjusted his hat as he slipped off her saddle and onto the hard earth, his legs shaking from the exertion moments before, but as the trundling of the train eased into the distance, the sounds of the desert returned to him. The hissing of insects, the call of a vulture overhead, and the beads of sweat rolling down his skin. He pulled off his hat and wiped at his face with his sleeve, his sticky lower lip catching the fabric. 

“Damn,” he said, his voice rough from the yelling, “Damn that green-eyed, waste of my damn time-”

The horse didn't say anything, standing still beside him and with her coat glossy from the sweat and strain earlier, but as the dust settled on the railway, George took one last look into the tunnel, then grabbed his horse by the reins and walked her along the cliffside. Her hooves were steady and unencumbered as she moved slowly beside him, happy to be led into a shady spot beneath an overhang and away from the harsh Arizona sun. He pulled the canteen from her back and took a drink from it, but without finishing it, he cupped one of his hands in front of her and poured the water slowly into it, careful to not spill it at all. When he drew the canteen back, his mare lapped at his palm until the skin was dry, and he sloshed the canteen from side to side as if to see how much was inside. It wasn't heavy anymore, no longer a steady weight to hit her in the flank when she galloped, but it wasn't completely empty either. It would be better, considering how high in the sky the sun was, to keep it at least a little water, if only for now. 

They stood in the shade of the cliff face for a little while, with George tipping his hat lower to obscure the glare and get a better assessment of the shrubland they had found themselves in. It was too dangerous to travel through the train tunnel, but he knew from experience and from the maps he had bought in that town – Mars – that the cliff face went on for miles and miles east. It was as thin as it was long, and so for the train it was only a temporary darkness, but for him, it was uncertain if he and his horse would make it through the same tunnel and out the other side alive. He didn’t know the schedule, but he didn’t want to guess. 

“Come on, girl,” he sighed and slipped his boot into the stirrup, hauling himself onto her back again, “Let’s get out of here.”

Calaway wasn't the largest desert in Arizona, but considering the canyons on two sides of it, it often felt like a melting pot in the middle of nowhere rather than an essential travel route. There were two mapped communities – Mars, a town known for its tombstones and cattle, and Sanguine, named after the mud which filled the town whenever the occasional rainfall hit. George, at least for now, let his horse canter alongside the northern cliffs. There was a spring somewhere in the canyon, but finding his way in was a new adventure to be had, and considering the known ambushes and bandits in the area, he felt safer with his hand on his hip than he did with them both on the reins. 

He guided his horse through a patch of wild hedgehog cacti, which bloomed orange and let out an overwhelming smell to match. George pressed his bandana to his face as his eyes watered, and he let her find her own way through as he struggled against the coughing fit coming from deep in his chest. It might have been the dust, dry and arid from the weeks without rain, but before he could think further on it, his horse cleared the patch and he squinted. 

This patch of desert was uncharted, no paths or landmarks aside from the railroad that lead through the north-east corner, but the north-west wasn't exactly overwhelmed with structures either, and he hadn't expected to see hoof marks in the hardened clay. Native Americans were his first thought, moving across the land to their next home in the canyon, but it appeared to be only one horse, as if the last person to come through had been waiting somewhere else for the rain to stop. There weren’t any plants on this patch of earth, with most of the prickly pears and grass sitting in the ditch below, but as he brought his horse to a stop and looked around, George didn't see any houses. 

A crack in the cliff face, however, caught his attention.

It was the kind of thing anyone would notice and decide not to explore – leading all the way up and trapped between a long wall and a rock butte, before the cliff continued on around the desert in a wide, arching semi-circle. The crack, he realised when he kicked his horse into motion again, could lead through to the other side of the cliff. If he got through and trailed along the outside again, he could possibly reach the train tracks. His horse’s gait shifted him from side to side, and he kept his eyes on the crack in the cliff face, where the red rock temporarily gave way to a sliver of azure sky. It was larger than it appeared at first, no longer a small, cramped space but enough for a horse, maybe a cart along with it, to go through. 

It took a few minutes, maybe five at a minimum, and as he reached the space that made the canyon the hoof prints on the floor grew deeper and more gouged out. Fresh.

If there ever was a warning sign to turn back, George thought as he adjusted his hat, this was it. He was damn near certain that he’d be ambushed by people brandishing their bows and arrows any moment, or bandits with their six-barrels and iron hooves, ready to leave him for dead. 

But his horse had no hesitation in moving to the crevice, and George watched as the wide crack drew closer and they moved into it. It went as far up as the cliff itself did, but due to whatever river had run through here before, the top of it was narrower than the bottom, only allowing the harshest, densest sunlight through. His horse’s breathing was no less heavy than outside, but beneath the rock was cool, and he could see the other side arriving faster than he had expected. George, at the last moment, grabbed his hat and ducked his head, before breaching the other side of the canyon. 

It was a small, sandy area. Shrubs and purple wishbone bushes grew on each side, with the sun burning away whatever foliage might have otherwise grown in the centre, but that wasn't what caught his attention. To the side of this area was another horse – a grey mare, in contrast to his own black and white steed – which brayed and moved away at the sight of him. She wasn't a fleet footed one like his own, but instead had dark hair growing over each of her hooves, and she had the markings of a pit pony elsewhere – namely the horse collar around her neck. She didn't take kindly to him being there, and even though he was already on his way around the outer side of the area to avoid upsetting this other horse further, she whinnied again and dug her hooves through the sand. 

“Easy,” George said, and put a hand out to her as his own horse continued to the other crack in the canyon’s face, “easy girl.”

He could see through to the other side – it was easily big enough for any horse or carriage to get through, much the same as the crevice before – but instead of the stream or canyon side he had hoped for, all he saw was a home and mine entrance, which was no doubt where the other mare’s owner was. George pulled his own horse to a stop and thought for a few moments in the shade, where it was still cool. The grey mare went over to the other side of the area, near to the opening he had just come from, but thankfully she didn't make any more noise or moved to escape. His dark horse tossed her head as a fly landed on her mane. He waited, listened, and heard- wait, that was water. 

His kind would not be welcome here. Be him a cowboy, a bounty hunter, a grave digger or a sheriff, he could have been anyone in the west and this person wouldn't have wanted to see him. No one came into the canyons to be with others, even if their profession relied on being out there. Mines, especially for a mineral good like gold or iron, spoke volumes if there was a lone miner. 

George kicked the sides of his horse again, getting her to move around the edge of the space once more, and he glanced at where the shrubs were brushing against his legs. They didn’t smell particularly strong, unlike the perfume of the cactus flowers from earlier, but he could smell something else. Fire. Gunpowder. 

“Don't move, cowboy.”

He pulled his horse to a stop immediately, and she grumbled at the motion of the reins. George didn't turn his head.

“Get off,” the man said, and George did so, “Look at me.”

As if it would ease the situation, George raised his hands slowly so that they were beside his head, and he dug his boot into the sand as he turned to face the stranger. As expected, through the second crack in the sandstone, a miner pointed a double-barrelled shot gun at him from ten or so feet away, only just in sight from where he was crouched behind a rock. George could only just about see his coal-stained hands and dark hair. Even with the harsh sunlight coming through in slices, the man looked almost purple in the shade. 

“State your purpose. Why are you out here?”

George swallowed around the dryness in his throat. 

“Found myself in unknown territory and after a tough spot back there, I lost the only man I know who knows this side of Arizona. I figured there might be water for my horse through this here crevice, but now that I’m here, I can see that I’m mistaken.”

“That you are, stranger,” the miner said, but he didn't lower his gun, “but do you really expect me to believe you?”

“It’s as much the truth as I have,” George said, “and now that I know I’m wrong, I’d appreciate it if you’d let me be on my way.”

The miner watched him with keen, sparkling eyes, like onyxes under an oil lamp, but he still didn't lower the gun. George could clearly hear the crickets in the grass near them, whistling and oblivious to the bartering for his life going on, but this miner, from what little he could see of the man, didn't seem like the killing type. Actions, more than pictures, could speak a thousand words and this guy wouldn't shut up. His filthy hands shook. His eyes wandered to the horse and snapped back. Distracted, but why?

“There’s water,” the miner eventually said, drawing his weapon back slightly, but George thought against lowering his hands, “steam through the rock, you need to walk that way.”

Finally the man took his hand off the gun, gesturing behind him, but just as soon as the temporary reprieve came it was gone, and his hand was back on the barrel. George nodded to him, and slowly, lowered his hand to the bridle of his horse. 

“And I assume you telling me means I can lead my horse to water?” George raised an eyebrow, hoping to God that his attitude was enough to stop him brain from being scattered across the sand.

“You can, but I can't guarantee she’ll drink.”

The miner’s face was still hidden behind the rock and his gun, but George just nodded as his mouth quirked, lowered his other hand to his hat, tipped it, and began the slow walk through the second crack in the sandstone. Eyes followed him across, and as he reached the site of the mine, after the house, the miner spoke up.

“What’s her name?”

George glanced at him, but didn't stop his deliberate movements.

“Dew,” he said, “And yours?”

“Nimbus.”

“A wild one, huh?”

“You bet. First time I sat on her back she went and kicked me right off again.”

George’s hairs on the back of his neck prickled when the miner left his sight, but he forced his footsteps to remain steady as he led Dew along. She seemed happy enough to be walking beside him, with the sweat on her back cooled from the shade and her breathing much lighter than before, but then again, she never was one to recognise danger. That was the sort of thing he needed in a horse – fast footed and stupid enough to follow him anywhere. 

The miner’s horse had seemed too hard-headed for her own good, too brash and ready to kick up a dust storm if anyone crossed her path. Nimbus seemed right for her – grey all over and angry to boot. She seemed a lot like her owner.

As the gun tracked him across the space, George spotted the small stream around the corner of the crevice. Dew moved between him and the miner, and as he went out of sight he could hear the other man adjusting his grip on the weapon, but whether he was lowering it or raising it, it was impossible to tell. 

Another moment later, both George and the miner were unable to see one another, but with the stream coming into view he stayed calm and let each of his steps be sure, one after another. 

The waterside was a little churned up, both hoof prints and the marks of shoes in the mud along its bank, and it looked like the miner had used some of his time and a shovel to pull up the small shrubs and succulents that might have wanted to grow along its edge. There was also a log buried half into the earth, where its surface had been run smooth from someone sitting on it for long periods of time. There was a sheer surface of orange rock on the other side of the water, which seemed to stand maybe seven metres tall, and the indigo sky above it stretched on even further. The water was fairly shallow, possibly only going up to his knee at the middle point, and he could see some small, insignificant fish struggling against the current. When he led his horse to the water, she drank on her own accord and he leaned down to fill his canteen too. The water brushed his hand. It was cool to the touch. 

“What’s your name, stranger?” 

The voice came from a few metres behind him, still within the walls of the crevice, but when George turned to look at him the gun was lowered to the floor. The miner had his other hand shoved in the pocket of his brown trousers, leaning against the rock.

“What’s your name, miner?”

“I asked you first,” the voice came now, lofty as if he was teasing.

“And I asked you too.”

The miner didn't say anything for a moment, watching George and Dew as they took their fill from the stream. If George had looked up stream, the river twisted and turned in a way that made him think the spring wasn't too far ahead, and he realised what the miner was looking for. Gold, if he was correct, and it explained the gun-happy attitude this guy had in spades. 

“Right,” the miner said eventually, “I get what you’re playing at. Not telling me what you’re here for, not telling me your name. Bounty got you?”

“Naw,” George stood and bottled the canteen, “Just down on some luck.”

“Not related to the law at all?”

“Naw,” he tipped his hat up so the miner could see his face better, “just me and Dew, trying to head east but having no luck for it.”

“East?”

“Uh-huh.”

“What for?”

“Someone I know up there,” George tried to keep his voice light, “You know Indiana? A town there.”

“Sounds like you're out of luck then. Are you hoping to ride up?”

“Was gonna catch a train. Missed it though.”

“A shame,” the miner said, “it’s not often you get that train going by. I hear them sometimes, seen them too, but it’s not often.”

“What are you doing around here?” George couldn't help but ask, resting his hand on Dew’s neck, “Are you alone?”

The miner didn't answer. George swallowed, feeling as if he had stepped on a nerve.

“It must be peaceful.”

“It is,” the miner said, voice strange, but he didn't speak up again until George grabbed Dew’s reins. 

He turned her around, her hooves sinking into the water and immune to the fast-flowing liquid running around her, and he was in clear view of the miner again. He still had his gun lowered to the ground, indifferent to whether or not George had a gun of his own (which he did – most lonesome men around Calaway had some form of protection, be it a gun or knife or any other number of weaponry), and he had to force himself to look at the man’s face with an emotionless expression rather than a curious one. Something about the miner spoke about pride and damage at once, and while George knew he wasn't the most forward of people, something about this man made him want to ask about it. 

It might have been his downward tilt of the lips, the unshaved face or dark hair. Maybe it was the fact that they’d already shared the names of their horses and at least a little bit about one another, or it could have been the desperation settling in as George realised the one azure sky was slowly but surely turning a darker blue. 

Almost as if he could tell what George was thinking, the miner spoke again.

“You seem like a man down on luck,” he said, “Where are you heading now?”

“I was hoping to head south.”

“Directly to Sanguine?”

“Yessir.”

“You won't make it before nightfall.”

“I know,” George said, and his wet leather shoes hit the riverbank again, “but forgive me for asking – what’s it to you?”

The man looked at him like he was trying to skin George alive, but behind those wet lenses he could see some kind of intense, smouldering heat, ready to catch alight and explode on him at a moment's notice. Men like that didn't take kindly to hearing a no, but he hadn't stated his intentions or what he wanted yet. George had money, not a lot, but enough for a bargaining chip.

“I have a fire pit and enough food for two,” the miner eventually said, and George raised an eyebrow. Before he could say anything though, the man continued; “You have a pack on your horse, if my eyes aren't failing me yet, so you can sleep outside without the fear of bandits getting to you. I don't want you in my house or down my mine – it’s dangerous down there and you dandy types aren't for it.”

“Well, that’s mighty kind of you,” George said after a second, “and I understand the mine. Being under cover like that ain’t for me. But are you sure you’re willing for me to camp out in front of your house for the night?”

“Yessir,” the miner said, “I got enough space for it.”

He was telling the truth. While the canyon faces lead up seven metres or so, the actual space between them was easily ten to twelve metres across, with the miner’s home built into the wall to save space. With the sandy wall and shrubs only lining the outer edge, it would be a hell of a lot more comfortable than waking up in a batch of chollas or with a gun pressed to his tongue. The miner took a step closer, his gun still lowered, and George nodded. The other man smelt like tobacco. 

“I’ll give you something for it,” George said, but the miner raised his hand to stop him from reaching for the pack on his horse. 

“Naw, all I need is company. Now, do you prefer beans or stew?”

George’s mouth quirked. 

“Anything’s better than nothing.”

As the sandstone canyons went from honey coloured to amber, the sky aged with it and turned to the colour of boysenberry jam, like a fruit aging ungracefully and becoming dark with mould. The hollowed-out area with the miner’s home and entrance into the caverns darkened quicker than the areas outside of his little hollow, but the campfire alighted the old stone so that it was back to its ruddy brown colour that the two of them, without a doubt, knew all too well.

The entrance to the mine, at least on the floor, had an ashen stain to it which had been dragged around the sands like a spirit that refused to be forgotten, and even after the miner had put his gun away and washed up his arms, the reminder not only of his profession but also his unknown history remained. 

Secrets followed him like a dog followed a cart of cadavers, and George had no doubt that to this stranger he was the same. No one willingly lasted alone out in Calaway, no one willingly wasted away and turned to sand out there in the desert. No one wanted to be forgotten without a good reason for it.

But he couldn't ask. As the miner stirred the stew over the campfire, his eyes and hair were his darkest points, melting into the background as lard did on a cast iron skillet. The shotgun was behind the piece of wood he had dragged over to sit on, and George had let his own holster sit undisturbed in the sand surrounding them, its barrel still in the leather to avoid the corrosion. 

“I never got your name, stranger,” the miner asked, “do you have one?”

George was quiet for a moment. Dew brayed as Nimbus came too close, and he could hear her hooves scraping the earth as she moved away from the other horse. 

“Will you give me one too? Fair trades and all.”

“Sapnap,” the miner, Sapnap, said, “Unusual, I know.”

“I was going to say fitting.”

“Am I strange?”

“No, but some things don't add up.”

“How come?”

“Are you alone out here?”

“I’m with you, cowboy,” Sapnap said, banging the spoon he’d been stirring the stew with against the pot, and he moved to put another piece of wood on the fire, “and I want a name.”

“George.”

“Just George? No other names?”

“Yessir, just George.”

“You don't gotta call me sir.”

George chuckled, “old habit.”

“From who?”

“I used to be an apprentice. Carpentry.”

Sapnap nodded, “Not a bad one to go into.”

“And you? What brought you to mining?”

“I inherited it.”

“I’m sorry to hear.”

The implications were clear. No one was willingly alone out here, but sometimes people left without so much as a goodbye. George stared into the fire and thought of Dream, and then of what his previous teacher had said when he’d been picked up for training for the trade. 

Alive or dead, people needed coffins. Sapnap and George had been no exceptions.

George changed the subject.

“How long do you think the ride to Sanguine is from here?”

“On my horse, and at a walk? Maybe six hours.”

“And mine?”

“Yours seems to have spunk, got a real fast one on your hands, huh?” 

“You bet.”

“If you really needed to hustle, maybe only three hours. You need to go the safe route though. In Stele Valley you’d be hard pressed not to find someone who wants the shirt off your back.”

George shifted where he was sitting, looking at how his scuffed-up boots turned golden in the light, but he didn't speak up again for a moment. His pack, brought over from Dew’s back after he had unsaddled her, lay off to his right. 

“I’m sorry I need to ask this,” George began, “But I think I might have been delt a dud when I bought my map of this area.”

“You don't often come this way, huh?” Sapnap asked, “You want to show me it?”

“Yessir, if that’s alright with you.”

Sapnap gestured towards George’s bag with his free hand, the spoon still resting in the pot over the fire. George moved to it, moving aside his canteen and other, frequently used supplies for his map. The corner of it was torn from where Dream had pulled it from his hands, but the paper was otherwise still intact and sepia from age. It was second hand, maybe even third, by the time he’d got his own sweaty palms on it, so only God in heaven knew how accurate it was. 

The miner looked at it. He looked at it for a long moment under the light of the galaxy above them and in the humble remembrance of the campfire, before he lowered it and looked with his dark eyes at George. His mouth was a smooth, faint line. 

“This is about as accurate as a blind man shooting.”

“Aw hell.”

“I have another,” Sapnap said and stood.

“Are you willing to part with it?”

“Don't push your luck!” 

George chuckled to himself as Sapnap went into his shack, the white back of his shirt being the only thing visible for a moment before he went inside the building, but he returned a moment later and shut the door. He came over to the side of the campfire, ignoring their self-imposed rule of sitting on the opposite sides and no longer held back by the flames which had been ignited between them. Instead he stood to the side of the fire and held the map out directly to George, his fingers dark beneath the nail. 

“Here,” he said, offering George the world, “take a glance.”

George, looking at him for a moment, hesitated. Sapnap waved the map again before he reached with his right hand and took the folded piece of paper from him. Sapnap withdrew his hand, withdrew himself, and returned to his space on the opposite side of the campfire. 

The map was more detailed than the one George had bought, with place names and known routes written neatly, and with valleys and other formations in the rocks drawn in. The entire north-west section of the map was printed out, too, no longer left blank with the impression of it just being a large, continued, sandy space of Calaway. There were actual settlements sketched in some areas, not just larger towns. Around five miles west, there was an inn. Sapnap’s mine was unmarked, but there was a small, red dot where George assumed they were, especially since on further inspection, the dot was made from red wax. It was the only spot on the map.

“Yeah,” George said for lack of anything else, “a lot different.”

“Sure is.”

“So this is…?”

George pointed to the red dot of wax and asked it more for the sake of something to say, but Sapnap just stirred the stew and nodded without making eye contact. He folded away the map as the other man finally decided to say what he’d been thinking about.

“Fort Rock, or at least that’s what I’ve been told. No one really knows about me being out here aside from a few townsfolk. No one to check on me for rattlesnakes and scorpions though.”

“Fort Rock,” George leaned back slightly and looked up at the sky, “huh. Why ‘fort’?”

“You know how you just stumbled across this place? Didn't intend to come here?”

George hummed in response.

“That’s not an accident. Fortified with how it’s in the rock face. As hidden as an oasis in a desert.”

“Literally.”

Sapnap laughed lightly.

“Yeah, you said it.”

There was a moment where neither of them spoke, with the campfire and the distant sound of running water being the only noises to share between them. It was, as usual so far out in Calaway, a beautiful night. George didn't regret removing his hat. 

“So your person in Indiana. Are you related at all?”

“A friend.”

“Whereabouts?” Sapnap asked, poking at the coals with a long, metal rod.

“Gospel, to be specific. We were both trying to get there together,” George admitted, “but he ended up going without me. Call me a sucker and a fool but I need to get to him.”

Sapnap watched him over the fire for a moment before asking, “Why?”

George was silent. The crickets in the bushes around them creaked like a door being opened and closed, but they never spoke with words or meaning. When Sapnap reached for the cloth beside him to get the pot off the fire, George straightened his spine and tried not to sigh. His none-answer spoke enough words for Sapnap to know he wasn't one to talk about it, but something about knowing this stranger meant that words were about as rare as rocks were. 

“He was the only guy I knew,” George said quietly.

Sapnap raised an eyebrow, not looking away from where he was pouring them both a bowl of the oxen stew.

“Knew?”

“Well,” George accepted the bowl, “I guess I know you now, miner.”

Sapnap smiled.

“I guess I know you, too, cowboy.”

He left early the next day, just as the crickets began to settle and the sun skimmed the rocks on the horizon. Now that he was outside of the crevice Sapnap had built his home in, the Calaway desert’s flat plains waited before him, stretched out and eager for his entrance.

Or at least that’s what he told himself. 

The desert acted more like a bowl than anything else, with canyons on many sides of it and with only a few areas to slip between and out into the open world. It was a dust trap too, with only the outer sides being rocky and tall and with the centre being hollowed out over time, like an old lake which had died with its last rainfall. The floor was mostly sand, with aloes and other varieties of shrub or cacti littering the area, but some outcrops of red sandstone still remained as the barest hints of what the place looked like thousands of years ago. To think that at one point this may have been covered in water, or lush jungle, felt both like he had missed the boat or been cheated in some way. The sunlight grew harsh as he made his way across the flat planes towards Sanguine, and despite setting off early, the desert still stretched out before him.

George adjusted his hat, then his bandana as the dust got to his nostrils and coated the insides of them with a thick layer of red soil. He tried not to squint too harshly, but he was more than aware of the effects of sun-blindness and the pale sand, so he didn't enforce the rule too harshly for the sake of his eyesight, since he didn’t want to be among the old-town folk who wore glasses and squinted through them, too. George walked Dew along, his breathing steady. He just didn't want to be caught out there alone, at the mercy of the bone-drying winds and erosion. 

He and Dew made their way across the flat sands that marked the trail southwards, and the canyon and cliff faces moved behind them slowly, lazily, as if they were the things moving instead of George and his horse. The white diamond between Dew’s eyes was bright in the harsh sun and George reached forward to pet her dark mane as they continued their weary, cumbersome walk. Cicadas or crickets (it was hard to tell which) made noises in each bush they passed, catching the last mates before the sun would tire them out too, the sun acting as a great equaliser and silencing all in its gaze. George spotted a rattlesnake hiding in its stone den, but it moved further in when it felt the vibrations of Dew’s hooves coming closer. An eagle, or maybe another vulture, passed overhead, with its great wings casting a shadow over the landscape, as if it was reminding the world of its benevolent existence. 

George’s gaze flickered to his left, where a senita cactus stood in a wide clump, maybe five or so feet high. He was tall enough on Dew’s back to see that there was nothing there, only shrubs and probably a few insects, too, but he watched it as they moved onwards. They’d only been riding for fifty minutes or so, and were a good three hours or so away from Sanguine, so it was too early to be jumping the gun and shooting at the breeze, or cacti in his case. The map Sapnap had handed him, which he had changed his mind and said George could keep, was inside his vest along with his money and his notebook. A small pencil was in one of the pockets of his chappes, and six-shooter on his hip. The gun’s polished outsides reflected the sun in small spots across the desert, but it wasn’t noticeable outside of the shade. 

He breathed in, and he breathed out. Dew kept moving, the canteen on her back clanged with each movement of her hind leg, which hit her flank and the saddle, and the morning light drooped over the land, refusing each cloud which suggested an interruption.

But just as George began his entry to the desert, minding the entrance to Stele valley – the one Sapnap had warned him against entering – he heard the sound of a pistol being fired.

He kicked at Dew’s sides, and she brayed before kicking into gear, her hooves thundering on the soft earth as George leaned forward, over her neck, and he heard the whoops of people behind him. The bandits exited the valley, chasing after George even as he avoided it.

They were already in a full sprint, their horses beating the earth at speed as they came closer, but Dew was still only just coming up to speed. Her hair whipped at his face, hitting his hat and his eyes as he leaned over her to help with the wind, but it was too late.

A rope lassoed around his waist, and George was pulled from Dew’s back as she screamed at his loss, and a cream-coloured horse dragged him along as a brown, speckled one chased after her, sprinting off into the desert. His ribs made an unsavoury cracking sound as he hit the sand, his fall only half-absorbed by it before he was dragged on his back a few feet. Miraculously, he kept his head up as his body was dragged over rocks and a few shrubs, and no unexpected reptiles or scorpions came to say hello. When he came to a stop, wincing at the pain in his ribs, he caught sight of a diamondback rattlesnake as it decided to hide from him. 

The man on the cream horse, his shirt brown with age and hat containing a few holes, not to mention the yellow bandana over his mouth, watched him as he moved on the floor, but he said nothing. George turned from the snake to face him fully, wriggling like a centipede on the hot sand.

“You son of a bitch,” George spat, “The fuck are you staring at? Let me go!”

The man said nothing still, even as George struggled against the rope and the pain in his ribs from the fall, along with the scratches no doubt on his back and head. He tried to kick at the legs of the cream horse, and felt sand seep into every crevice in his body, in the corners of his eyes and the crook of his elbow. But before he could launch himself into another cluster of swears, the man on the brown horse whistled, with Dew’s reins in hand, and the man on the cream horse cut the rope. They kicked their horses into another sprint, with Dew being forced, bucking and whinnying, along with them.

George, struggling against the loosening rope, shouted at them.

“You! You motherfuckers! Hey!”

But the bandits were gone by the time the rope set him free and he slipped out of it. He stood in the middle of the Calaway, further from Sanguine than he was when he was born, watching as his only horse, his bedroll and canteen, disappeared into the sand like water. 

George panted, sniffed and rubbed his nose on his sleeve. His body was covered in dust, and due to it, his mouth had become as dry and arid as the sand. He was surrounded by sand, on all sides, and under the hot Arizona sun, if he didn't act he’d soon become just another thing for the wildlife to consume, for flowers to grow through, but he didn't have time to have flowers through his ribs. 

He breathed as deeply as he could with his injury, put the bandana back over his mouth, and took his gun in his left hand. 

George turned and made his way on foot back to Fort Rock. 


	2. Chapter 2

“Your horse got stolen,” Sapnap said, voice flat.

He was holding the shotgun again, immediately suspicious of George coming back with nothing but what he had been carrying and no horse, but George just kept his hands beside his head and his mouth a straight line. He didn't dare smile at the sight of this familiar face, even if he wanted to, and he really hoped that Sapnap would be willing to let him drink from the river again before he was either kicked out or killed. If he died bleeding into a cool river, it might as well have been heaven. 

“Yeah,” he said, “I was avoiding Stele valley, like you suggested, and the sons of bitches came out of it anyway and caught me off guard.”

Sapnap’s mouth twitched downwards. Nimbus came to George’s side and nibbled at his fingers, still not sure if she should trust him but more than willing to eat him, it seemed. Maybe horses got bored of hay and oats, like humans got bored of whiskey and grits, but still consumed them anyway. Her head came a little too close to the broken rib in his side, and he took a small step away from her prying mouth.

George watched with bated breath as Sapnap lowered the gun again, and even though he wasn't hiding behind the rock today, he looked as reserved and hidden as anyone behind a brick wall would. 

“You look as shaken as a cottontail that out ran a coyote,” Sapnap eventually said, “but I don't know what you expect me to do about it.”

This was the tricky part. George drew in a breath and let it go again, before speaking up without brushing beside the point. Sapnap watched him.

“Can I borrow Nimbus?”

Sapnap’s brows immediately furrowed, his gun rising as his body tensed, and George turned his face away as if not looking at him would avoid his wrath, but he didn’t say anything for a moment. It was almost like whenever Sapnap got pissed he had to close his mouth to stop an explosion, and George winced when the quiet lingered a little too long.

But then Sapnap came closer, gun still in hand and all of his warmth from the night before gone, evaporated like water under the rising sun.

“I swear to god, cowboy, you playing tricks on me is a damn stupid way to die – “

“It’s not a trick, I swear. It’s a crock of shit and bad luck, is all.”

“Then how come you came back here? The map I gave you says there’s a town through Stele valley, and without your horse, the worst you’d lose is your pride and an hour or so of your time.”

George’s throat closed as he swallowed.

“I hadn't thought of that.”

Sapnap scoffed, “yeah, I bet.”

Sapnap’s gun was still lowered to the floor, thankfully, and even with it being pointed away from him George didn't feel comfortable enough to put his arms down, keeping his hands beside his head in a gesture of both goodwill and surrender. His ribs ached with each breath in, coming as a wheeze rather than any sort of normal sound, and Sapnap’s head tilted like a curious dog when he recognised it.

“You’re injured?” he asked.

“Just a fall, when they pulled me off my horse.”

“And you're not injured?”

“It just took the wind out of me, is all. Might be bruised but nothing life threatenin’.”

Sapnap looked him up and down again, before he said, “put your arms down, cowboy.”

George did so.

“You have two nights with Nimbus before I come to town and put a warrant on your head,” he said, “I know the sheriff in Sanguine – he’s one of the few I do know – and the town a day’s walk west has a telephone. If I don't hear from you before the third night, I’m coming to look.”

“Yessir.”

“Buy yourself a new horse or something,” Sapnap finally said, “and have a bath while you’re in town. You smell like you rolled in coyote mess.”

George’s mouth twitched downwards, but Sapnap eventually turned away and went to the entrance to the mine, and he pulled the saddle off the beam above him before whistling. Nimbus left George’s side, lazily moving towards him, and Sapnap threw a multi-coloured blanket over her back before beginning to tack her up. The horse collar came off first, then he threw the saddle on her back as she shook her mane out, and he put the bridle and bit over her face. It only took a few minutes, with Sapnap taking his sweet time to get her organised, before he guided Nimbus by the reins over to George. 

“If you get in a shootout,” he said, handing her to him, “make sure you take the bullets and not her.”

George’s lip quirked, “yessir.”

“Two nights,” Sapnap reminded him, taking a step back.

“Two nights.”

Sapnap watched him, with George watching him back, too, before he eventually nodded and closed his eyes before turning away. 

“Goodbye, George,” Sapnap said.

George watched him go to his house, and before he closed the door, George whispered.

“Goodbye, Sapnap.”

_Goodbye, George_.

He said it like it was the last time they’d see one another, George thought as he guided Nimbus, as furious and unwilling as her name implied, through Calaway. He petted Nimbus’ dark hair, but it did little to soothe her, and she tossed her head as if his hand was a pesky fly. She hadn't tried to buck him off yet, still getting used to being around him, although he was near certain he’d have the pleasure of getting off the floor eventually. He didn't look forward to it, surprisingly, and his definitely broken rib ached with each lazy step she took. 

George took the long way around Stele canyon this time, far enough away to just see the top of it, but not to see its base or part way down. His hips moved in time with the horse, and his hat shaded his eyes, but without his canteen and in the midday sun, George knew that he had to make it to Sanguine that day to be in with a running chance to get back to Sapnap.

 _Goodbye, George_.

But what _had_ that meant? He debated with himself as Nimbus made her way over a rocky outcrop and down into the sands once more, appearing to ignore everything other than the steps she needed to take to move forward, and George could appreciate that in her. Even if she hated him more than a tarantula hated fire, she was good at what she did and didn't complain the whole time. His weight meant nothing to her – she would move the same way regardless of his presence. 

So Sapnap had obviously expected him to disappear, or otherwise be gone for a long period, longer than the two nights he’d allowed George to have Nimbus for, which brought up the question of why he let George take the horse in the first place if he didn't expect him to come back with her.

He breathed in as deeply as he could with the broken rib and let the air out of him just as quickly, wincing with the feeling. 

Maybe Sapnap was a kind soul and hated to see a guy stuck on his own, in much the same situation as the one he himself was in. Maybe he didn't want Nimbus but instead the bounty his head might warrant. Maybe Sapnap wanted George as far away from him as possible, or maybe Nimbus knew how to untie her reins and would come back to him anyway. 

Questions upon questions, sand upon sand, and no answers nor water to break it up.

The sun rested, like a king on a throne, at the peak of the sky. It was a million miles away, yet hot to the touch. His ribs ached, and he would have one hell of a bruise on his arm tomorrow. 

He felt like he’d left everything on Dew’s back, and when she was taken from him, everything he knew went with her. An unfamiliar man, an unfamiliar land, and an unfamiliar horse to bring him back into reality. Sanguine couldn't come soon enough.

He arrived in Sanguine on a horse that hated him a little less just as the orange sun, sinking like a saucer into the ocean, set behind the southern canyon wall. The lights in town were just being lit, with the lamplighter holding his stick high above his head to ignite the flames, but his body swayed – a bottle of Old Overholt in his other hand as he moved from side to side. A woman, sausage curls in her hair, avoided his gaze as Nimbus’ steady gate became slow at the entrance to the town. Without his input, she walked to the trough of water at the side of the dirt road and shoved her head into it. 

George got off the horse, sliding from the saddle like a snake back into its den, and grabbed her reins as she drank the water down, greedy. Sanguine was quiet, aside from the aforementioned faces he’d seen when he came into town, and now, aside from the unsteady lamplighter, the main road through town was quiet. He could hear music, the faint chimes of a piano, coming from the saloon further in town.

He led Nimbus away from the water, reluctantly, when she stopped drinking. She still would have rather been flanked by wolves than walking beside him, but her black hooves, orange from the dust, still moved by his side as he walked her. The exhaustion both of them felt was keeping the atmosphere calm.

The sheriff’s office, still lit inside, waited for him further into the town. He passed the saloon, bustling with both folks like him and of the town, their horses waiting outside without complaint, and he moved on with Nimbus still in hand. He eventually came to the horse-tie outside the office and secured Nimbus to it, even with her doing her darndest to stop him from moving her around, before he patted her flank, moved up the stairs, and went into the office. 

It was well-lit inside, with framed certificates and images of the town on the walls and with a few chairs beneath them, and a small window waited on the opposite side to the seating area. He moved towards it, passing the shutters until he could clearly see the man behind the desk, tapping incessantly at the heavy typewriter behind it. George pulled off his hat as he waited for the receptionist – a clean cut, dandy-looking man – to stop his sentence and to look up at him. Eventually, at least three sentences later, he looked through his spectacles at him.

“Hello,” he said, his voice lacking a strong accent, “What can I do for you?”

“I need to talk to the man in charge about some stolen property of mine,” George said, “bandits out in Stele Valley.”

“A report?”

“Yep.”

“I’ll see if he’s around,” the man said and stood, “please wait here.”

So George did, not that he had another choice. While there was a hallway leading further into the building, he could see the hefty wooden door leading into the room where the cells were kept, along with a couple of other doors, presumably locked, which would lead into offices or a staircase upstairs into the sheriff’s quarters, but there wasn't a clear way through the building. He didn't sit on the chairs behind him though, anticipating a quick in and out when it came to reporting Dew being stolen from him.

A few minutes later, the man with the spectacles came and sat down behind the typewriter again, stating, “He’ll be here in a minute,” before typing again.

The noise of the typewriter overran the oil lamp burning above them in the ceiling light, but George could still hear the mosquito trying to find a nice place on his neck to bite into. He waved at the side of his head, walking over to the wall of framed pictures and certificates but with no real recognition to them. The sepia toned images were just ones of the main street, the inside to the saloon, a blacksmith’s. There was a newspaper article too, faded from age, about a train heist being prevented in 1860, but the picture in the article was small and none of the faces had any features. He could hardly distinguish skin tone. 

The door down the hallway opened, and a man in boots that looked too big for him stood from it, looking at him. George looked to the sheriff star, then to his face.

“Hello,” he said, for lack of anything else. 

The sheriff came forward, putting a single, grubby mitt out for George to shake. He had a pyramid cigar in his mouth, his tongue licking the end as he looked at George down the end of his flat nose, and his moustache was wet with sweat. His ten-gallon hat was bright white, like a point of pride that he could keep the insistent dust from outside off it, and was damn near the only man in town who could. He smelt like alcohol, one of strength that he probably shouldn't be taking on the job, but George just let it roll over him. He wasn't here to make friends, but he didn't want any enemies either, especially not in this building.

“Step into my office son,” he said, “Tell me your troubles.”

“What’s your name?” George asked, only to keep appearances. He knew this man already, plenty enough for a lifetime.

“Call me Schlatt.”

“Sheriff Schlatt.”

“Something funny?” 

“No,” George said, moving around the room so that he was sitting opposite the big seat, “Just repeating it.”

“You ain't a parrot, now sit down.”

George did so.

The room was dim, the lamp in the far corner obscured with books as if Schlatt were sensitive to the light, and the lone window to their right was covered with a set of blinds. The room stank of old cigar smoke, like the man had never heard of an open window and intended to keep it that way. The desk before George was made of an expensive, polished wood, and the whiskey bottle was more than half empty. He couldn't see any full ones, but another empty one was on a cabinet, filled with burnt cheroots. Schlatt’s eyes almost glowed beneath his hat, and before George could speak, Schlatt stood with his back to the door, and the lock clicked into place.

“George Fleet,” he said, “You’re a brave man for showing your face around here, son. Brave or stupid.”

“Desperate times,” he said, quietly. 

“I bet my bottom dollar on it. What brings you back?”

George swallowed, the tar in the air sticking to the dust he’d inhaled earlier, and he felt his rib twinge. 

“Dream’s on his way to Gospel. He hitched a ride, and I didn't make it. I’ve come back to waste the time away, is all.”

“And you're here, in my office, because…?”

Schlatt’s gaze was piercing, slicing right through his stomach and gutting him like a trout, but all George could do was meet it as well as possible and state his business. He didn't like the idea of dealing with Schlatt as much as any man alive and with a brain, but things happened and he was here. 

“Dew’s been stolen, as with everything else.”

Schlatt whistled, “Good thing it wasn't too far out or you’d be baked alive. Where was this?”

“Stele Valley.”

There was a moment where neither of them said anything, but then Schlatt repeated, “Stele Valley?”

“Yessir.”

“How in the hell did you get here before sundown?”

“I borrowed a horse.”

Another pause, before, “I see.”

Schlatt went through his desk and retrieved a heavy-looking incident book, which was covered in a fine layer of dust. He placed it on the desk and unscrewed the cap of the inkwell, gathering his pen and leaning the tip inside its opening, but he didn't make any movement to pick it up again or open the book. 

“See, George Fleet,” Schlatt kicked his boots up on the desk, “I happened to glance through the door at the steed you rode in on. She’s a real looker, strong, too, but I know her. That horse isn't yours, and I happen to know the miner it belongs to.”

“I do too,” George began, but Schlatt raised a hand to stop him from continuing. 

“And I know what you bought off the last time you were here. You have a habit of taking things without asking, son, and I’m asking you now to pay up for the habit. Standard business, you know.”

George looked at Schlatt’s boots on the desk, at the worn down sole and stained leather, before his eyes flickered back to meet the other man’s. They watched him like a hawk, waiting to see if he’d bend or break under the strain of being in his territory. 

“The miner, Sapnap, said I could borrow her for two nights while I found another horse.”

“Yeah, and I happen to know he’s not a friendly one. He wouldn't let you take that horse if you were the last thing between drought and the world’s last rainfall. George, I don't know specifics, but I know you have his horse, I know you’ve stolen goods from Mars in the past, and I know there’s a bounty on your head for one-hundred dollars, and I know you want to remain a free man.”

Schlatt leaned forward and tapped his cigar on the ashtray, and the soot he left behind smouldered like it was going to alight again. George wrung the rim of his hat in both hands, keeping it in his lap to stop Schlatt from seeing his nervousness, but in the dark room Schlatt would be hard-pressed to see anything but the end of his cigar and the light beneath the door. 

“Fifty bucks and your secret is safe with me,” Schlatt eventually decided. 

“I ain’t guilty.”

“I never said you were, but you _look_ it. Appearances pay these days, or so I’ve heard. Mars would be mighty pleased for me to bring in a wanted man, even if you’re all pally around here.”

Schlatt watched him. George admired the floor.

With a sigh, Schlatt opened the book and tapped the pen on the side of the inkwell, fingering through the pages of criminals and convictions, executions and burials before he reached the page of arrests, and as he pressed the nib to the page, curling it around in a large semi-circle, George spoke up.

“Wait,” he said, “I’ll give you the fifty.”

Schlatt put the pen back and ashed his cigar again, blowing out a plomb of smoke like a dragon. His eyes twinkled like stars in the darkness, and the badge on his vest was invisible. 

“Yeah?” he said, “let me see ‘um.”

George pulled his coin purse from his vest and opened it. He counted ten, twenty, thirty, forty, forty-five, then fifty, and Schlatt watched his hands move the money around greedily, focusing on the shine of the coins and the fold of the bills, before George, with some reluctance, pushed the money over the desk. Fifty, counted like his last days alive, and Schlatt made sure to double check. 

“Alright,” the man said, his moustache twitching, “You’re off the hook for now, son, but I don't want you causing any more trouble around here, you hear me? Your bounty is high enough without adding any more offences to this list. Fifty is a small price to pay when the alternative is your neck.”

Schlatt stood and gestured for George to do the same, and the other man went over to the door to his office to unlock it, but he only held it ajar as George asked his next, pressing, question.

“What drove it up?”

The other man looked at him, raising an eyebrow like George had said something stupid.

“Your pal Dream,” Schlatt said, kicking the door open further, “and you being his left-hand man. Now get out of my office.”

Ten bucks to his name, George paid to sleep at the inn and dragged Nimbus, bleating and furious, to the blacksmith. 

George couldn’t see the face of the man inside who was sweating over his forge, but his muscles moved in waves across his back as he dragged the coals forward and back, raking them to cultivate the flames. His hands and arms were dirty, even with the gloves he had going up his forearm, and the leather apron he wore was covered in scuff marks. When George tied Nimbus nearby and went over to him, the man looked up.

“You’ve got gall showing your face around here, George, given what happened the last time I served you” he said, standing up from the coals, “You better have a good reason.”

“I have two, if you’re willing to hear it,” George replied, leaning against the rough wooden pillars which made up the blacksmith’s open-air shack, and he watched as the man pulled off his gloves and went over to the barrel of water. 

He washed his hands in it, apparently uncaring for the residual warmth from the metal he’d used the water to temper, and he looked up at George as he dried his hands on a rag. For lack of anything better to do, George tipped his hat at him. 

“Sam.”

The blacksmith’s, Sam’s, lip quirked. 

“Give me your reasons, cowboy. Without your little friend I’m more willing to give you a shot.”

“This horse,” George gestured to Nimbus, “has just about worn through her shoes. I was wondering if you’d be willing to give her hooves a lookin’.”

“Can do. What’s your other reason for being here?”

“I need money, and I’m willing to give you my time for it.”

Sam snorted, turning towards Nimbus and looking her over. She looked about as sour as a rotten lemon, and she threw her head from side to side as Sam watched her. He raised an eyebrow and turned to George. 

“Where’d you find her?”

“I borrowed her.”

“From the canyons? She’s wild, and someone with more bravery than sense shoed her.”

“She’s clearly a working pony,” George tried to defend, feeling like he needed to keep up appearances for Sapnap, but Sam just shook his head.

“Pit pony, cart dragger, whichever – she doesn't want to be here. Are you ferrying her about for a favour or something?”

“Yeah,” George said, “I was gonna get her reshoed as a thanks.”

“Well,” Sam slapped him on the shoulder, “I’ll do it this time, but whatever lady you got waiting would prefer flowers next time. And as for payment,” Sam grabbed an empty bag and threw it to George, “Do me a favour and get some errands done for me?”

George snorted but took off his hat, beginning to undress so that he didn't get coal from the furnace or other dirt on his clothes, and Sam just chuckled to himself as he went to get his farrier apron. 

“Come back in an hour and I’ll shoe your horse,” he said, “and in the meantime, I’ll get you a list.”

Sam was too good to him, but that didn't necessarily mean he was a good guy either. 

George fanned himself with his hat as Sam started shaping Nimbus some new shoes, and he watched with little interest as he dunked the horseshoe into the water again to temper it. Nimbus was more than happy to eat the oats George had bought her, and she fanned her long tail around as the flies got too much for her. It was just past two, and the shade creeped over Nimbus so that she was completely within it, although just behind her was still in the hot sun. Occasionally, townsfolk with their orange-stained clothes walked or rode past, but George didn't see anyone he recognised. 

Sam put the last horseshoe into the water and watched as it temporarily bubbled and hissed, before he pulled it out again and let it sit on the table with the other three to dry. George’s shoulders ached with the tasks Sam had given him earlier that day, but without his blue shirt and red handkerchief, not to mention the vest, he looked like any other poor soul stuck in the west. He fiddled with his boot, rubbing his saliva-soaked thumb along the embroidery, but the dust didn't come clean. 

His ribs ached worse than the day before, but George’s breathing was still steady. Sam hadn't seen the bruise running down his right side. 

“She seems to have calmed down,” Sam said, pulling off his gloves again and washing them in the same water he’d tempered the shoes in, “so I think we’re alright to do it now, starting with the back.”

“Do you need me to help?”

“Yep. Hold this, will you?”

Sam handed George a box of nails and the hammer, before he went to grab a pair of clippers and a rasp. They went out into the dirt where Nimbus was standing, almost glaring at them, and Sam dragged over the stool George had been sitting on, placing his tools on it and grabbing the things he’d handed to George too. Her tail flicked from side to side.

“Give her a pet, will ya? I’ve got some apples in the shop and a knife, so she might take the treatment sweetly if you help her out a little.”

George nodded and went to gather them, pulling two off the bowl and returning to Sam, who had Nimbus’ back, right leg between his knees. He faced the opposite way to her and was already making short work of pulling off the old shoe, which looked like it had been worn down for months before Sam had gotten his tools on it. With his clamps (George wasn't sure about the term for them, but they were almost like crab claws), Sam gently pried the worn-down shoe off along with all of the nails, and he brushed his hand over the dusty surface that was revealed. The face of the hoof didn't seem damaged, and as George sliced off slivers of the first apple, he watched a Sam used the hoof clippers and the rasp to shape where it had overgrown, before picking up his hammer, one of the steel shoes, and he put six of the copper nails into his mouth. One by one, with three taps each, Sam nailed the shoe into place, with the orange nails glowing in what light came into the shade. 

Her tail brushed over his back, George saw, just as her mouth met his fingers and started to nibble at them. He turned back to her and pet her nose as Sam moved on to the next foot.

A short while later, for Sam was a dab hand at his profession now, all of Nimbus’ hooves were re-shoed and Sam was putting the spent shoes in with his scrap metal as George fed the mare the core of the apple. She tossed her head as he pet down the flat side of her neck, and he waited for Sam to say something.

“I don't know where you found her, but she’s a working one, like you said,” he said, “I’d advise you to come back in at most a month and a half to have her done. Her hoof was quicking, the front left, so it’s worth coming sooner if you can.”

“I’ll bear it in mind,” George said, “Thanks Sam.”

Sam went to wash his hands again, but he rubbed his hand over his sweaty forehead without thinking before he did so, and a thick line of black soot stained his skin. George’s hand curled around Nimbus’ snout as she butted it into his hand, but he just brushed over her grey hair and brushed her wild, unkempt mane back. Gently, without really thinking about it, George untangled a knot in her hair as Sam kept talking.

“I’d be wary out there,” he said, “and I’m surprised you picked her up in the first place though. Did you get her from Mars?”

“No,” George said immediately, “I’m avoiding that backwards town for the time being. Last thing I need is to catch their crazy.”

Sam laughed, “Wise. I only ask because I saw a horse seller down there the other day, one that had apparently cropped up overnight. I wouldn't trust him with an unopened can of beans, let alone an animal.”

“What was wrong with the guy? Mars is known for livestock.”

“What caught me was that all of the horses had different temperaments and different saddles. Reminded me of someone who only took what they found,” Sam took a swig of a glass bottle, clear, and George paused his fingers in Nimbus' mane, listening closely as Sam continued, “You know how it is around here. I was going to say, if you picked her up there then there was a good chance she’d been stolen.”

“Reports coming in of it?” George asked, sceptical, “I mean, someone’s gotta notice if it keeps happening.”

“Someone probably would,” Sam admitted, before he went over to the bowl of apples again and threw it up into the air.

George watched Sam’s face when he came closer, but Nimbus watched the apple instead as it went up and down, her head moving slightly in George’s hands.

“But It’s about time you got your own horse, anyhow, even if she is a stubborn one,” Sam said and held out the apple for George to take, “Dream can't keep pulling you around like that, telling you what to do and what not. Where are you two heading now?”

“Mars, probably,” George said, mostly from instinct.

“I thought you were avoiding it.”

“We are, just might take our time to get there.”

“Still trying for the train, huh?”

“Yeah.”

“Best of luck to you both,” Sam said, “and give that apple to Dew for me, will ya? I need to keep your horses sweet on me.”

George snorted, “as if she wasn't already.”

“It just makes things easier,” Sam turned back to his forge, “and say hello to Dream too, I suppose. Good luck with the train.”

“Thanks Sam. Seriously.”

The man chuckled, “Yeah, yeah. Don't worry about it.”

He didn't have time to check the train times, and he gripped Nimbus’ reins tight in one fist as he looked around the corner of the main street, at a man with a temporary spot and about ten different horses.

Mars was as dusty as sanguine but with the population to match, and instead of it being a thick, orange fog over the floor whenever anyone moved, it laid flat, in wait, for when the rains came and disturbed the surface. With Nimbus’ hooves in proper working order, it had only taken him about four hours to get to Mars instead of the estimated six, and George watched, quietly, intently, as Dew drank from one of the water troughs. 

She and around nine other horses were tied to a single, wooden stake, and three men loitered around them in the centre of town, trying to attract passers-by into purchasing their horses. Even the cream and brown horses George recognised from when Dew was stolen were being advertised, none the wiser to their fate at the hands of the sellers, and he felt a pang of pity for the poor things. If they’d developed a bond at all with their owners, then they’d be in for a nasty surprise when they were lured off and never saw them again.

It was getting dark – a mix of the setting sun and the fat, wide, nimbostratus straddling the landscape and riding the winds towards them, east to west. 

His stomach growled. His ribs ached, and quietly, George looped the end of Nimbus’ reins loosely around a pole nearby so that he could go closer alone. Nimbus moved to follow him, her hooves dragging on the floor, but ultimately couldn't make it more than a foot. She watched him with dark, watery eyes as he moved forward. 

His heart beat in his throat like a drum, willing himself to be brave and brash, but manoeuvring two horses was harder than one, and he wanted to be smart about this. He was already a wanted man here, as Schlatt had so kindly reminded him, and leaving Nimbus or Dew behind wasn't an option. 

Crouching, he watched as the man selling the horses talked to someone who was interested in a different one, which was brown and white in colour, but one of the other people who had helped get the horses there – a man he recognised since he had dragged him off Dew’s back – was still walking around. George fiddled with his belt, slipping his hand over the leather and brushing the top of his vest, before his hands touched the cold, weighted steel of his six-shot pistol. He left his fingers there, watching as a lamplighter walked along the street, before withdrawing it, readying his aim, and firing at the stake. 

The effect was immediate. 

The main seller ducked as four of the horses came loose and bolted, one of them kicking as if it had been hit and forcing another one into movement, and three horses took off down the main street. 

George ran forward as two of the men chased the horses, and the third man was getting up just as he reached Dew. 

She was tossing her head back and forth, startled at the noise and commotion, but George grabbed her by the reins and pulled at the knot on her bridle, kicking her side in a panicked movement, and she bucked like a bull at a rodeo. She brayed, and the man looked up at George and his horse just in time for the rope to come loose. 

“Yah!” he shouted, grabbing his hat, and Dew bolted down the side street he’d come from, her hooves thundering and her head tossing, but George pulled her back, grabbed her hair when she didn't stop, before she came to a screeching holt.

Yells came from the town, shouts as people came out of their homes, and George panicked, going back for Nimbus on foot as Dew went from side to side, whinnying and braying as if she wanted to kill him, but as soon as George pulled Nimbus free, and a shot rang out from behind him, he pulled himself onto Dew, kicked at her sides, listened to his horse scream, and they fled Mars’ centre. 

The road out of town was the next problem.

For all of Mars’ benefits, be it the train station, the bustling cattle sector, or the influx of people hoping to get a taste of the ‘real west’, it sure could have done with a different road layout. George dragged Nimbus’ reins close, trying to keep Dew at a pace where the slower horse could keep up while needing to get the three of them as far away from the pistol shots and angry shouts coming from the centre of town, chasing him down the quieter streets. He felt his legs squeeze at Dew’s sides, not used to how much thinner they were after the day and a half spent with Nimbus, but as the bigger of the two horses whinnied and shouted into the encroaching night, a tremendous boom, like dynamite being set off, came from the east. George snapped his head to look as a great fork of lightning shot out and scattered across the clouds, like a steel wool being set alight, and another peal of thunder roared throughout Mars and the rest of the Calaway. 

The air, instantly, became cold.

George turned back to them racing west, moving at Nimbus’ full pelt but not enough to escape the cold wind following them. Men on horses were a hundred metres away, shouting, yelling at him, and more shots rang out as another clap of thunder came through, and a bright white flash illuminated the canyons and red sands, turning them silver. 

The land was still solid as he escaped the path into Mars, the one flanked on either side by cattle fences, and he whooped and slapped Nimbus’ flank to keep her going, but she just tossed her head, panting, keeping up with Dew as she cried and called out into the dusk. They left the final house in town behind, kicking up a dust storm as the sand became fine. Dew tossed her head, a dark mass upon the lighter ground, and pushed herself forward.

He encouraged them to keep going, to keep moving before the rock below them turned to clay, before the sands and dust turned to mud and kept them there, but George just lowered his hat, sharpened his eyes, and moved forward on Dew’s saddle. 

The night was falling, and without a lantern, it was a matter of riding for as long as possible before being forced to take shelter somewhere. He was too close to Mars still, still within eyesight, to stay here. He was too far from the canyon wall to the north to feel safe, but George encouraged his horses and squinted at the dark. The clouds behind him spat, then trickled, then poured water down onto the parched lands of Calaway. 

George continued on, moving through the rain as if intended to never be found. 


	3. Chapter 3

Fuck. 

That was all George could think of. Nothing else came to mind. 

The overhang came as a blessing and a curse, as it was just large enough for him and the two horses to stand beneath, but it wasn't large enough for him to be completely covered from the rain. He watched, panting and shaking off his soaked hat, as water moved through the canyon in droves, sinking the cacti and shrubs which grew at the sides, and he thanked his quick thinking to go for the overhang which was a struggle to get into, as the other one, lower down and easier for the horses to get into, was already almost submerged. 

The water came from the sky just as quickly as it ran through the canyon, but the foreboding crackles of lighting above him were not a good sign. George took off his hat and shook it out again, feeling the freezing water soak the fabric despite the wax intended to keep him dry, but in the desert night the cold liquid had seeped through just about everything, dead or alive. The railway beside Mars would have been submerged by now, or damn close, and George was thankful when he remembered the slight edge leading down into the river near to Fort Rock. Hopefully Sapnap, if he didn’t wake up from the storm, would have dry feet when he arrived the next day.

Calaway was dripping, soaked through, and George was in much the same way. Dew shivered with her wet skin, Nimbus’ tail was dipping into the water at their feet, and George’s ribs ached with every inhale, like he was disobeying a command from his body to stop breathing. He could hear the rush of water flowing near to them, the rain pelting on the water already landed, and the distant sound of thunder as the eye of the storm passed overhead. 

He sat on Dew’s back still, hoping to God that the purgatory that the desert kept throwing at him would end by morning. 

The earth had turned to clay overnight, and George walked beside Dew and Nimbus instead of on their backs in the vague hope that it would stop the three of them sinking. It was successful so far, but Nimbus’ hairs at the bottom of her hooves were clumped down with the soft earth, and George hoped above everything that Sapnap’s mine hadn't flooded from the rain. If the surrounding, sandy area hadn't been soaked down and weighted, and the stream nearby hadn't burst its banks, then there was a chance, if glimmering and small, that Fort Rock, and Sapnap alongside, would be okay. 

And so he moved, gasping at the wet feeling in his lungs, through the sodden Calaway.

It took an hour on foot from where he had waited out the night, and he felt it with every breath he carried. They came out heavy, encumbered, and laden with the sweat dripping down his spine.

He passed a small, waterlogged area of Joshua trees and a leafless mesquite, and basked as the brief and fleeting shade scattered across him, but all it did was make him feel cold. The wind from the day before, which had remained even as the rain had come and gone, made him shiver. 

It took longer than it should have, but the crevice making up Fort Rock came into sight and he breathed out heavily at the sight of its yellow-gold canyon walls and red rocks in the way of the entrance. The floor near there was of a heavy, sodden clay, dragged down by the rain and gathering in mirror-like pools near to the entrance, but all it reflected was the pale grey sky.

The storm clouds had moved on, but the cacti and wild grass were still downtrodden, and they brushed George’s trouser legs as he moved beside them, through the arching canyon overhead, and through into the actual area making up Fort Rock. 

He let Dew and Nimbus’ reins go, like a cocoon letting go of a butterfly, and of their own accord they moved through into the drier area where Sapnap’s home and the mine entrance were. George followed them, paused at the door to the other man’s house, and reached with one shaking hand to knock. 

The air stood still, and he waited. 

Finally, like the pop when an old wine bottle was opened, Sapnap opened the door to him and squinted into the daylight. It was still early, still dripping from the eaves of his home, and George took off his hat with shaking fingers as Nimbus came over to them both. She looked between the two of them like a mother expecting a fight between children, but all she did was press her cold nose to George’s face, and he raised a hand to meet it. She moved away shortly thereafter

“George,” Sapnap said, shocked, and he took a step back from the door, “I wasn't expecting you so early.”

“Or at all, I’ll bet. Hell of a storm last night.”

“You look like you’ve gone and swam the Colorado. Come inside,” he said, leaving no room for argument.

Sapnap stepped out of the way of the door and George, almost with reluctance, took a step inside the dark cabin. Two of the walls were made of the same sandstone as the canyon cliff faces, but the other two were made of wood, and overwhelmingly, it smelt like some kind of pine. He had a table in the middle of the room, a stove immediately to the right of the entrance, and behind the door was his bed with unmade sheets. On the far side were two shelves, with only one of the spaces used for books and all of the others for food storage and folded sheets, and at the end of the bed was a chest for clothes. A basin was on the far right, and a smaller, counter-like table was beside it. Sapnap kicked a stone in front of the door to stop it from closing behind him, and he moved over to the dining table to pull out a chair for George. With some reluctance, he walked over and took the offered seat, and Sapnap went to the stove. It was still warm, it seemed, since Sapnap let his hand hover over the surface before pulling it back.

“Go ahead and take off your boots if you want to,” Sapnap said, “You seem like you’ve really taken a beating with that storm. I wasn't expecting you back so early.”

Dew was poking her head through the doorway out of curiosity, watching her humans walk about inside and talk to one another, but neither of them paid her any mind, or didn't until Nimbus came to do the same thing. Sapnap looked at her as George was taking off his rain-soaked boots, and he turned back to him as he put his Stetson on the table.

“You got her back?”

“Bandits were selling her in Mars,” George said in ways of an explanation.

“So you  _ bought  _ her back?” Sapnap whistled, “Damn, I wouldn’t have. I would have stolen her back just to spite them.”

George’s mouth quirked, looking up at him, and Sapnap’s face fell slightly. 

“If you bring those bandits back here I swear – “

“I lost them in the storm,” he said, “Don’t worry about it.”

Sapnap’s eyebrows fell as he frowned, looking at the two horses before stating, “I’m going to look them over,” and leaving the room. 

George watched as Sapnap, in another display of unexpected trust, kicked the rock he’d been using to keep the door open out of place and let it close behind him, giving George privacy to whatever he pleased in Sapnap's home. He could hear Sapnap leading the two horses over to the mine entrance, where he had seen Sapnap hang Nimbus’ saddle and bridle before, and he let his elbows rest on his knees and hung his head as the woozy feeling washed over him. 

The adrenaline, the fear and the lack of sleep were getting to him, George thought as he tried not to move his head too suddenly, but as soon as he was out of Sapnap’s hair he could dry his clothes somewhere and fall asleep between two trees. The last thing he felt like doing was returning to Sanguine to spend money he didn't have on the inn, but if worse came to worst, he’d just have to make the trip. Camping out overnight wasn't bad so long as it was sheltered, but George knew more than some about open fires attracting a trouble greater than just insects. 

But then Sapnap came back, and George raised his head to look at him as he went to grab George’s hat. He hung it on the back of the door, near to the stove so it would dry out a little, and Sapnap looked at him like he was a squirrel that he’d dragged out of the river. With the door being closed, it was much darker in the room. 

“You look like shit,” Sapnap told him.

George tried to say something, opened his mouth to follow through with it, but his voice croaked and he shut it again. Without another word, Sapnap unfolded his arms and took a step forward to him, and he pressed the palm of his cool hand to George’s forehead. He pulled it off a few seconds later.

“You have a fever,” he stated.

“Naw.”

“Saying you don't ain’t gonna change it.”

“I’m just warm, is all,” George said, “I should be heading out soon, anyway.”

George stood up as if to prove his point, but he wobbled where he stood and grabbed the table a little too hard. Sapnap grabbed his sleeve and held him upright, but the other man felt the wet fabric as he did so.

“If you go out now you’ll collapse in a saguaro and won't be able to tell the difference between it and a lover – “

“I’m fine, damnit.”

“You got a fever easily a hundred degrees, so sit down.”

Sapnap’s tone left no room for argument, and as George looked him in the eyes, which swam from side to side, he let Sapnap push him back into the wooden chair. The other man watched him for a few seconds, looking between his eyes as if he expected George to be drunk, but he lowered his head when a wave of nausea washed over him. Sapnap ignored him and went over to the chest at the end of his bed.

“Take your shirt off, it’s freezing. I’ll lend you one of mine.”

“You’re being too kind to me, stranger,” George said. 

“Hey now. I thought we agreed we weren’t strangers?”

“Maybe not, but we’re as good as them, right?”

Sapnap didn't say anything, but George heard him opening the chest and going through his belongings, and he spied the shotgun on top of the door, hanging from the two pegs keeping it in place. He thought of his own pistol, still hidden in part by the overhang of his shirt now that he was sitting down, and he pulled his belt out of the loops to put it on the table, still in the holster. Sapnap had been watching him, his eyes following the glint of metal, before he sighed quietly when George’s hand drew back. Sapnap turned his gaze away to give him some privacy. 

George shucked off his vest first, taking care to fold his half-empty coin purse over and hid it within the leather, and he untucked his shirt. Even with the vest underneath, the bruises from his fall were flared and unhidden, and Sapnap stared at the mottled, revealed skin. George turned to look at him, unashamed at his bare flesh, and he raised an eyebrow at Sapnap before the other man got a hold of himself and stood up, a dry shirt in hand. It was an off white, clearly old, but it wasn't soaked with clay runoffs and rain, so it was better than nothing. When Sapnap came back over, he looked down at the black and blue bruises down George’s side and raised an eyebrow at him.

“I remember you saying you were uninjured.”

“It’s just bruising,” George said, but Sapnap took his arm gently and raised it, taking a look at the beginnings of the mottled skin before it disappeared under his vest.

“Are you sure your ribs are okay?”

“I’m fine.”

“No cracks?”

George glared at him, which he knew was a bad idea for two reasons. Sapnap was, against better judgement, trying to help him but George was being feisty and refusing to accept it willingly, and secondly he was right. It could have been something more serious, but with the constant shifts of wind and sand out in Calaway, there wasn't a way to check without dredging up unwanted medical bills, debt from needing to rest and eat, and money-stealing bandits or inn owners. The best option, even with the guilt attached, was to thank Sapnap again and again for his kindness; pride be damned. 

Eventually, George admitted, “I don't know.”

Sapnap put his hand on George’s shoulder.

“You’re staying. Take off the vest so that I can see the damage.”

George, reluctantly, did so. He winced when his arm went above his head, but schooled his expression smooth again when he threw the wet fabric to the floor. 

The bruises trailed up his side as well, not as bad as his arm and without the stiffness, but now that Sapnap crouched beside him to assess the damage on his right side, George’s breathing was becoming more obvious with each wheezing breath. Sapnap trailed one warm, dry hand down his side, carefully brushing over each rib until George flinched at a specific one lower down, near to where his elbow would be should he have been standing. Sapnap pulled his hand away, but didn’t lower the arm just yet. George scowled at the door as Sapnap moved his arm around to see him clearer, and eventually let his arm drop again.

“Cracked,” he said, “just one by the looks of it. With the fever and the weather last night, I wouldn't hesitate to call it pneumonia.”

“You a doctor?”

“No.”

“You know the fancy names like one. I’d hesitate to call it anything specific.”

“I’d hesitate to call it anything it isn't,” Sapnap’s dark eyes flickered to his face, even when he was still crouching, “And you need rest, cowboy.”

Sapnap handed him the shirt and George, reluctantly, put it over his head. He watched as Sapnap went to get a bucket from beside the washbasin and a dirty rag, but he didn't say anything until Sapnap had given him something to say.

“I can't stay here,” George said, “I’m a wanted man.”

“You're safer here than in the sun or the sand. Take my bed. I’m going to wash the mud off Nimbus and yours… Dew, right?”

George nodded.

“Take my bed, George,” Sapnap said as he went out the door, “And if you try and leave I’ll let the winds turn you to jerky before telling anyone you were here. Take the damn blessing; you’re as stubborn as my horse.”

The door closed, and Sapnap disappeared with the motion. George sat there for a moment, dumbfounded but thankful for the dry shirt on his clammy skin, and he waited until the steps both from Sapnap and the horses disappeared in the direction of the stream before letting out a long, rattling breath which ended in a painful cough. He sat there, bent over the floor for a second trying to get his breath back, and even as the coughs went away the wheeze still remained. 

He wiped his mouth on the sleeve, looking down at the fabric as the phlegm-coloured stain was dragged across the white fabric, and he glanced over at Sapnap’s unmade bed. On unsteady feet, George stood up and hissed at the flare of pain through his ribs, before he shucked off his wet trousers and hung them over the back of the chair. He bent down to adjust his shoes and put them beside the chair upside down, letting the small amount of water drain out of them and onto the floorboards, before he rubbed his legs up and down with his hands. The fingers were still cold, but the friction at least brought back some feeling to the skin. 

Gradually, with legs that ached with the first rest in over a day and a half, he made his way over to the bed. 

His head, unwisely, hit the pillow with a hollow sounding ‘thunk’, and he recognised the dim smell of old stone before passing out. 

  
  


_ George didn't know how long he had slept.  _

_ “Hey,” Dream said, in a hushed, whispering tone, “You’ve slept long enough, get up.” _

_ His eyes parted with a sandy-feeling motion, and the wide shade of the western redbud, along with its flowers, obscured the sun and prevented him from waking earlier. His bedroll was half dragged-out from under him, with his legs resting on the mat Dream had laid out below them the night before. Clouds, big, fluffy things, moved like battleships across the sky. George had never seen the ocean, but the sky, he believed, was the next closest thing – damn near infinite and just as unpredictable. _

_ Dream’s green eyes, hidden by his long hair and scowling brow, watched as he leaned up and dusted off a few of the pink flowers from the tree above. Given the nice night, they’d forgone the usual shelter-half and just camped under the stars, even if the unknown side effect was the pink petals from the tree scattering across their blankets.  _

_ George asked him something, but couldn't hear his voice. _

_ “East,” Dream shrugged, “like usual. Did you forget?” _

_ Dream’s kossuth hat had a flower from the tree stuck into it, and it sat on the back of his head, held on by unknown means but acting as a dark background for his hair. He turned away from George as he lit up his breakfast – a cigar – and he waved the match around to extinguish it. The sweet smell from the tree was replaced with the smoke, and as it filled his vision, George’s perception of the world went from pink to silver to black.  _

  
  


_ He opened his eyes and Dew moved below him, with Dream’s back pressed against his stomach as he guided the horse through a canyon – Stele canyon, if he was correct – and the walls of sandstone looked crimson like old blood.  _

_ The smell of the tree from earlier followed him, along with the faint cigar smoke, and George let his head tip back as he looked up at the pink, rose coloured sky. Dew’s back looked purple instead of black as George ran his hand over her flank, and his eyes drooped at the woozy feeling. Dream’s voice came muffled, in segments. _

_ Canyon… tunnel… train… George… _

_ Nothing came to him, no memories or ambitions. The canyon moved beside them like waves waiting to crash in, or buildings like the ones he’d heard about further east in Gospel.  _

_ The lavender sands moved below Dew’s hooves. Her canter was easy. Dream said nothing more.  _

  
  


_ He felt the guitar move through his bones as Dream plucked a few cords. It’s watery, uneven tones made him feel like flotsam at the side of a river, waiting for some poor, desperate soul to pick up, and he saw the motion of the stars above them go back and forth. He thought back to being baptised for the second time, at fourteen when his mom had insisted. He’d left home not long after. _

_ “We’ve got a long walk tomorrow if we’re avoiding Mars,” Dream said, “Given what happened with you the last time we were there.” _

_ George tried to speak, but no words came. _

_ “Yeah, it was you. Don't try and blame this on me.” _

_ A fire, the smell of it, came from nearby, but there was no noise aside from Dream talking. All he could hear was Dream talking. It was loud in the silent pod of sand and light they’d found themselves in. Even with the absence of the fire, the light remained, illuminating them – the important things – and nothing else.  _

_ “It was you, George, now pipe down,” he growled, “I chose to rob the store. You chose to shoot the guy.” _

_ He opened his mouth. Sand fell down his front, and the light faded. Dream watched him. _

  
  


He tossed over in agony, the feeling of his ribs pressing to the bed making him whimper, and he shifted to his other side. George’s eyes, sandy and raw, slipped open to look at some wood, but before he could try and stop himself, before he knew where he was, his eyes closed again.

  
  


_ He remembered oil on his hands, and him brushing his thumb and forefinger over one another before Sam handed him a rag to wipe it off.  _

_ The intense heat on his right wasn't going away when he left the side of the forge, or when he moved away from Dream, or when he moved over to Dew so that he was out of the sun. She pressed her nose to his hand, licking over the oil, regardless of what it was, as if she wanted to clean him. Sam moved behind her, on the left, to begin reshoeing her. _

_ “You need to stop working her so hard, George,” Dream said behind them, “seeing as she’s your pride and joy, and all.” _

_ George pressed his mouth to Dew’s twilight hairs and closed his eyes. As if through the film on a crocodile’s eyes, he could still see the milky world around him. Sam’s faceless expression looked at him, and the burning sensation spread across his chest and down to his stomach like a deep, unsettling iron brand.  _

_ “Her shoe came clean off, Sam,” Dream said, his voice coming across loud despite his efforts to be quiet, “Clean. Off. George is working her too hard just because he wants to get away from here, ain’t that right?” _

_ It wasn't true, but George pressed where his mouth should have been to the white diamond on Dew’s forehead as Sam moved to her lame hoof. She tossed her head from side to side silently, to remove the flies and bad choices she had made, as he had done.  _

  
  


_ “Gospel,” Dream said, and pointed to the map as if George was actually looking, “Look.” _

_ George did. He smelled the fresh pink flowers from before, the cigar smoke, the fire and the sweat on Dew’s skin as he looked at the poorly drawn map Dream had picked up in Mars. He hadn't been able to enter the town, too fearful of what had happened last time, and instead he’d taken to sticking it out in a hole nearby that stank of a bad omen. _

_ The air was colder than anything he’d ever felt, wet with rain and tasting of sand. Dream’s hand, painfully, gripped his right arm and George couldn't scream. His eyes were too tired. They drooped and struggled to stay open. Dream’s hand gripped him tighter and somehow a whimper escaped his mouthless face. He looked into the emerald eyes. _

_ “Are you even paying attention? Look! I just bought this map with all my fucking money and you can't even pay attention to it.” _

_ He threw the map at George’s feet.  _

_ “How about you make it on your own, huh? I’ll take my damn horse and you can take the map. We’ll see who gets further.” _

_ Dream’s hands went into the air as he walked away, as he walked towards Dew. _

_ “I care about the horse more than I do about you, anyhow.” _

_ George took shaking steps towards Dream, feet on the ground, weighted, but the other man didn't look at him as he got onto the horse’s back and pulled her so that George could see her profile, and Dream turned his face away. All he could see was the hat.  _

_ He gasped in the hot air, the overpowering smell of the perfumed tree and the feeling of sand in his mouth, but Dream turned Dew further away, turned himself, and despite the horse having her ears back and her tail moving from side to side, he kept her away. Her twilight hair and diamond forehead were moved from George’s hands, and before he realised it, the darkness had replaced her. He looked to where Dream had been. He looked to where the map was. He looked for the place that reminded him of a bad omen. _

_ All he saw was sand. In the invisible light, all he had was sand.  _

  
  


_ It was dark. He couldn't see his hands. _

_ The wall of rock guided him, but without the blessing of sight, George didn't know if he was gradually walking in circles, mirroring a fish in a bowl without the benefit of water, and his feet ached as soon as they hit the ground. The floor was made of a hardened clay, or otherwise some kind of solid, uneven surface that made little noise as he scraped across it.  _

_ It would have been easier to stop walking, to give up, but with no mouth to speak with it wasn't like he’d be able to call to anyone else.  _

_ The canyon wall was rough below his hand. The air smelt like fire. His clothes smelled like the flowers, following him, lingering. George was submerged in a darkness greater than night, and no stars lined the ceiling, and overwhelmingly, he was alone.  _

_ But he reached a point where the wall disappeared, and he pushed his hands out on either side, reaching for the surface he’d been clinging to, but it was gone.  _

_ Thin air. _

_ George’s shoes scraped the floor and he reached for that instead, but that disappeared too. _

_ Freefall. _

_ His stomach lurched, rippled as he moved down, down, down into the darkness, and his hands reached out for any point of contact as he descended into unknown territory.  _

_ But as the perfume from the flowers faded, his skin felt cold.  _

_ Opening his mouth, the decent stopped and he saw the faintest glimmer of something in the all-consuming darkness surrounding him, the light of a match, drawing closer. He blinked as if it would make the image clearer, but he felt like he was being forced from side to side as it drew closer, like being rocked in a cot or by the sea, and he opened his mouth. Bubbles came from his mouth, yet he breathed clearly, and a face appeared in the light of the match. _

_ It illuminated the man’s fingers, the dark eyes and hair on his face, and the gold became a river in the ceiling of the cavern above them. The rocking ceased, and despite the picture of the man in front of him, he opened his eyes.  _

  
  


“George. George. George!”

He started awake, flailing his good arm towards Sapnap, but the other man caught it with one hand and gripped it tightly as George came down from the panic of being dragged into consciousness. An oil lamp burned on the table in the centre of the room, marking out every dirty corner and crevice in the space, and Sapnap’s face was submerged in darkness as he looked at George on the bed. Seeing that he was awake, however, Sapnap picked up the oil lamp and brought it to the bedside table, bringing them both into the light.

“You seemed to be going through a pretty bad one there,” he said, “I thought it best to wake you. Are you feeling any better?”

George cleared his throat, feeling the dry, rapines as he did so, but before he could say anything Sapnap was going over to one of the bottles beside the stove. He brought it over, along with a glass, and poured some into it for George. It was just water, but the cool liquid made a difference like night and day as he swallowed it with greed. Sapnap waited, patiently, for him to reply. 

“Still aches,” he said, quietly, “But I feel a hell of a lot better having slept.”

“It’s still late,” Sapnap told him, “I don't mind if you want to sleep still, given you need it.”

George’s hand, in an act against his mind, snatched the sleeve of Sapnap’s shirt. The other man looked between him and the hand, before sitting down again in the hard wooden chair at George’s beside. He swallowed and watched Sapnap put one leg over the other, and the other man let George’s hand slide down his arm until their palms were pressed together. 

He breathed in, his head still swimming but a hell of a lot clearer than before, and he breathed out into the room as his rib settled back into its normal, fractured position. 

“How are you feeling?” Sapnap asked, his voice soft.

George could hear the gentle chirping of crickets outside, along with the noise coming from the oil burner as it chewed through the wick, but other than their breathing, there wasn't a lot to go on to describe how he was feeling. He could smell the faintest amount of sweat, though it was hard to tell where from, and the perfumed scent of the flowers in his dreams, the one Dream had kept in his hat, were gone. There was no strum of the guitar, the scent of a cigar, or the feeling of sand on his skin. George was, for the first time in a long time, away from his anchor. Sapnap’s hand was still in his.

“Could be worse,” George responded to Sapnap’s question, “just a bad dream, is all.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Weakly, George chuckled.

“It’s hard to describe.”

“Give it your best shot, cowboy.”

“Just…” he breathed in, “stuff from the past. Thoughts and feelings. The guy I know in Gospel? I knew him here before, and it felt like he was the only guy I knew outside of town until I bumped into you. We were a real pair of dice, if you get me.”

Sapnap nodded, and George continued, “I lost him on the day I found you. He caught the train – you know how I mean – and left me in the dust. I guess I was just remembering all the things I saw and didn't think twice about until I saw his face disappear into the coal cart, and the fever sparked it. I’m sorry if it freaked you out at all.”

“Naw,” Sapnap said, putting his foot down again, “Naw, you’re good. What was this fella’s name?”

“Dream.”

Sapnap chewed on the word for a moment, thinking, but ultimately he seemed to let the singular noun drop. 

“He seems like a piece of work if thinking about him had an effect on you like that.”

“I can handle it,” George chuckled, “I’m used to it.”

Sapnap’s face, although not quite sad, soured.

“You shouldn't have to be.”

George glanced at him.

“Life ain’t fair.”

“I know. No one should have to,” Sapnap sighed, “but it sure likes giving it to us anyway, huh?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I forgot to add notes to the last chapter bc I am small brain on occasion.
> 
> This chapter was really hard to write!! I hated it!! However - im glad I ended up splitting it and the last one in half since it would have been over double the length of chapter 1 if not.  
> I'd considered continuing with this story but I'm really excited for a new project I'm working on (you should check out my twitter if you want a hint ;) ) and I wanted to get this one out of the way and at the intended length/structure I'd planned for. 
> 
> Thanks for reading. Let me know what you think! Your comments have been fantastic so far!


	4. Chapter 4

They talked. 

There wasn't an awful lot else to do when one person was forced to stay in bed and the other was trying not to disappear into a hole for days at a time, but they talked in the meantime and Sapnap slept in a hard chair until his back ached and he took to lying on the floor instead. 

“I remember, well, I don't remember much about them, really,” Sapnap said, “Just as much as anyone does, I suppose.”

“And you miss them?”

“Of course I miss them! Hell, I’d be a mean one if I didn't miss my own grandparents.”

George put the glass down from his lips, some of the whiskey from it drained and he swallowed around the feeling of it as if he could flush it away.

“What about you?” Sapnap asked, “Any strong memories?”

“I remember getting Dew.”

“Bought?”

“Naw. My grandfather, he was a farmer see, and he had this old mare who was fit to burst with her foal. He was banking on a colt for the sake of selling on the mule that pulled the cart, even if she was a racing horse at heart and would make one in her own image, but Dew came out instead. In the end he gave Dew to me and bought a new stallion for himself after the mare died.”

“I’m sorry she passed.”

“Don't be. It wasn't for a few years after she’d had Dew, and we had a meadow for the cows and whatnot, so she was as happy as a pig in shit. She was black as soot too, so it was a surprise when Dew had the diamond face.”

“She’s a looker.”

“She is. Came third in a county fair with her.”

“Uh-huh?”

“Lost to a pair of stallions. White and cream, respectively. That was when I left home.”

“What put you on the road?”

“Ah. That’s a different story.”

“Keeping secrets?”

“Like holding cards.”

Sapnap chuckled and shook his head from side to side. He put his own glass to his lips and drank from it, draining it, before picking up the bottle of moonshine and pouring it out again. George did much the same and held his glass out to Sapnap, who filled it up again. He withdrew his hand when the glass was full and Sapnap put the bottle back onto the bedside table.

“You seem tired, miner,” George said, “Why don't you sit on the bed.”

“Why don't I?” Sapnap looked at him, his elbows on his knees, “I don't because you’re there.”

George shifted so that he was sitting on the other side of the bed, his left side against the wall, and he patted the free space he’d created on the sagged mattress. Sapnap raised an eyebrow at him, still looking at him over the stray hairs that made up his fringe.

“I’m not gonna fit.”

“You’re not that wide.”

“I know I’m not the wide one.”

“Hey,” George said, “I was always told I was as skinny as a bean.”

“A broad bean, maybe.”

George sighed, before scooching over to fill the space he’d just given up, saying, “Well now, if you don't want it – “ 

Sapnap’s hand came to smack his flank, and George laughed as he moved over again. The other man came beside him, smelling like the earth outside and fresh water, mixed in with the normal musk a man acquired from existing, and George tilted his head to the wall instead of Sapnap’s shoulder at the last moment, letting it make a hollow sound against the wood. The remnants of the fever were still in his system, making him woozy without the fever to go with it, and he breathed in deeply at the faint smell of whatever Sapnap had used to wash that morning. The other man leant his head back against the wall behind them instead, and with their whiskey glasses in hand, George spoke up.

“Where’d you get Nimbus?”

“Found her in the Calaway.”

“Wild?”

“At the time. I think she had a mister that she didn’t take to before me though.”

“You know how old she is?”   
“If I had to guess, maybe twelve, fifteen.”

“I was expecting her to be older. Maybe twenty.”

“She’d be doing well to make it that long. My father’s horse only lived to nineteen out here. I think it’s the dust that gets to them.”

“Maybe. So she was just wondering?”

“Yep. She was lame on one hoof, but she didn't resist me lassoing her outright, and not when I brought her here either. She only got aggressive when I was seeing to the hoof.”

“What did you do about it?”

“Pulled the shoe off myself, took her to Mars and got a farrier on her. He wasn't pleased at her aggression, but my excuse worked well enough. Those men are good, they don't like a horse in pain, and I said her hoof came clean off when it got caught on some rocks.”

“Smart. The guy I took her to said she was quicking on one of them, too. It might have been the same one.”

Sapnap didn't say anything for a second, but when George turned his head to look at him he had one of his eyebrows raised.

“You got her shoed?”

George swallowed.

“Her’s were looking a little worn.”

Sapnap continued to look at him for a moment before taking a drink from his glass and looking at their feet further down the bed. In the dark room, with the oil lamp burning on the bedside table, it was hard to see much of Sapnap’s face from the angle George could see it.

“You didn't need to do that,” Sapnap said quietly.

“Naw, but I wanted to.”

“Why?”

George didn't respond for a moment.

“I wanted to.”

“But what made you want to?”

“I don't know,” he said, “it was mighty kind of you to lend her to me like that, even if you didn't trust me. I guess I wanted to show my appreciation a little.”

Sapnap’s eyes trailed from the other side of the room and over to him, looking George in the face and having his own skin be obscured in the darkness. All George could really see in his expression were the watery reflections of light in his eyes, and even then, he couldn't tell the emotion running through them.

“Thank you,” Sapnap said, with a painful kind of sincerity.

George responded, but he couldn't remember what with, and the conversation continued in another, forgettable direction.

Even with the forgiveness from the sun, which had left him alone in the time he’d taken to recover, George felt weak and weary when he emerged from the five-day rest. 

He gripped Dew’s reins tightly, despite his legs being steady he couldn't trust them completely, and he walked with Sapnap and Nimbus down the stream he’d drank from just over a week before. The water was chilled, refreshing against his bare feet, and he held his boots in his other hand. He’d taken the time to roll up his trouser legs so that they’d remain dry, and the soles of his feet took kindly to the rocks and stones in the clear water, like they were thanking him for giving them more than wooden floors and the insides of his shoes to stand on.

George thought of all the strange things doctors prescribed, from remaining inside to drinking vinegar, and he remembered his mother’s warnings not to walk around barefoot. It made sense out in the desert – given the snakes, insects and arachnids that made their home out there – but when she’d refused to let him wade in the river it had come across as too much, and his current self was inclined to disagree with her too. Even if there were snakes in the water, it was worth the risk to feel the stream go between his toes. 

His shirt, the blue one, along with his other clothes were tied to Dew’s back as the followed Sapnap along, and the orange canyon walls, their clear view of the sun interrupted only by one another, slanted on either side of them. It was a steep drop from the top of them to the river, and the banks on either side were made of more rocks than sand, but nevertheless George felt safer with his horse in his hand and this man before him than he had in weeks. 

His ribs still ached, but the bruising had faded into an unsightly yellow, and his coughs had calmed down to just a quiet, tenuous wheeze. 

“The arrowhead is just down here,” Sapnap said as he drew to a halt, and he pulled Nimbus off to one side, “We need to get to the sides. Last thing I want is you falling straight in.”

“Does it have sheer sides?”

“It’s a spring,” Sapnap came beside him, letting George catch up, “Ground water. It goes pretty deep since it comes from below.”

George’s shoulder bumped Sapnap’s as they walked, and he looked at his feet instead of at the other man, fearful that he might slip. There were other things to worry about too, but slipping was what George told himself about and reminded himself of too, and not the man beside him, not the sky above him, and not Dew nudging him closer by accident. 

It was, as usual, as bright as a silver coin outside. The grass had dried since the last time George had been out for more than a piss and the cliffs either side seemed to be soaking up the sun like a cold lizard, but he could hardly appreciate it. He knew, more than some, the pain of sunburn and the hardened skin on his ears and shoulders from it before he’d invested in his hat, but the wind was a welcomed thing. It was a beautiful, delicate thing, reminding George of the last time he'd eaten spun sugar, and it eased the remaining hot, wet ache of his ribs. The pain was still undoubtedly there, still broken, but relieved. 

Sapnap lead him around another corner in the river, and as he’d said, a spring lay in wait in the ground. It was deep, completely see-through, going down for what seemed like only a metre but alluding to far more, and George wondered if the clear waters had ever been deadly to someone who had underestimated the depth. Like a magnifying glass, it made the rocky bottom seem closer.

Sapnap guided both George and his horse around the side of the spring, bringing them to a bank along one of the almost straight sides of the spring, which tapered into a narrow ‘tip’ at the opposite side to where the stream began. An arrowhead was right, Arrowhead spring. 

Sapnap took his time in removing Nimbus’ bride, and George instinctively moved to do the same, ignoring the twitch in his side as he raised his arm to help Dew out of hers, but Sapnap came to his side and helped him along a moment later. He moved the two bridles onto a rock near the water’s edge, and wordlessly, Sapnap began to undress from his earth-stained clothes.

George turned away, looking down at the entrance to the spring and at the enclosed canyon walls around them, but he didn't hesitate in removing his own clothes as well. His feet were already thanking him for the cold water, aching with relief, and he had no doubt that the effect would be the same elsewhere if he kicked about in the water for a while. 

It took a minute, but Sapnap didn't come to lend a hand when George’s arm got stuck in the sleeve, and a moment later Sapnap was wading out into the water, his skin golden under the mid-morning sun, and George watched him until he was just below waist depth in the water. The drop was only when they would be up to their chests, when it suddenly got too deep to stand, but where Sapnap stood was comfortable, and the other man had his hands raised above the water, his dirty clothes and the bar of soap he had brought with them above his head. 

Sapnap brought them to the water as George waded out into the spring as well, shivering with the sudden coolness that raised up his legs and pulled his hairs on end to act as goosebumps. Turning to look at him, Sapnap scrubbed at the orange stains in his shirt and watched as the suds and clouds of dust came through the water towards George, but the other man didn't say anything when George brought his own blue shirt forwards, only handing him the soap and letting George deal with the cleaning. He rinsed the shirt in the water as George began on his own, and the lye soap smelled like sandalwood as he brushed it across the fabric. 

With his hands busy, it was easy to forget the few inches between them and focus on the work at hand, but eventually Sapnap pulled his shirt out the water, reasonably clean and without the orange stains all over it, and he pulled it back to shore. George watched him without thinking about it, his hands stilling on the fabric as Sapnap’s naked frame moved out of the water and onto the bank where Dew and Nimbus were grazing the short desert grass. Sapnap turned around and looked at him, making eye contact, and George turned his face away.

“Is it clean?” Sapnap asked, “You’ve been scrubbing it for a while like you're trying to take the colour out of it.”

“Just a stain,” George responded, and he could see a reflection of his own face in the ripples of the water, darkened, “Give me a minute.”

“Toss it to me when you're done. I’ll put it on the rock with mine to dry out.”

George rinsed the shirt for a minute, with a similar effect happening with clouds of suds and old dust coming out of it when he did, but eventually he held it up, let the clear water drip from it, before twisting it to get the remainder out. George threw it over to Sapnap and watched him catch it, before turning back to the water with the bar of soap nearby, floating away. He reached to grab it again. 

“It’s colder than I thought,” Sapnap said as he waded back out into the spring, back to George’s side, “I hope you’re not suffering for it.”

“It’s doing me good, if anything,” George washed the water up his arms with the bar of soap in hand, “I feel like this is the first time my heart beat in days.”

“I’m surprised my cooking didn't get it beating.”

“It ain’t _that_ spicy.”

“I’ll try harder next time - it’s my kind of food,” Sapnap chucked, and George didn't look at him, “Scared away more than just coyotes. Nimbus used to sneeze when she smelt the spices.”

“She’s a prissy one,” George said, “seems to like her hay a certain way.”

A moment later, George stopped running the bar of soap over his arms and chest, before letting it go and giving it to Sapnap, who went to wash himself as well. George was reluctant to push himself further out than he was already, aware of the faint pain in his side from the fall. 

But the quiet washed over them, with the faint sounds of water coming from them as they washed, and George looked away from Sapnap. The sounds of birds, be it buzzards or vultures, came from the distance as a late call of morning, and George closed his eyes when a woozy, strange feeling washed over him. It wasn't quite the same as the illness of the days before – his fever had broken two nights ago but Sapnap wanted to make sure – but it was almost like the tiredness before staying awake all night, the false sleep. George flexed his toes beneath the water and breathed in deeply, just staring down at the rocks and whatnot below the drop off point, where the spring was coming from. It would be even colder in the centre of the water, not that it wasn't where he was standing. 

“Are you alright?” Sapnap’s voice came from beside him, and without raising his head, George’s eyes turned to look at him. 

“Fine.”

“You don't look it.”

“I’m fine, Sapnap,” George said, turning away slightly.

There was a lingering pause between them, seeped with George’s breathing, still raspy, and the sound of water dripping from Sapnap’s arms into the water. 

“Tell me about it, George,” Sapnap said, “We ain't got confessional out here so you might as well tell anyone willing to lend an ear.”

“What’s it to you?”

“What’s it to me? Nothing. You could say damn near anything and I wouldn't do shit about it.”

George sniffed, and he turned around to Sapnap again. The other man’s hair was dark and wet at the ends from when he had dunked himself under the water to rinse himself off, but he looked as open and as genuine as any man willing to save a life. George’s gaze flickered between his eyes, going from right to left to search deep for mockery or disingenuous intentions, but he found nothing other than the warmth in those heavy brown eyes. 

“You’ve been too good to me,” George said. 

“There’s no such thing as too much kindness.”

“There is around here.”

“Where? The spring?”

George knew Sapnap was playing with him, trying to get him to admit the things he was thinking so that he could pull the argument apart, but there was no argument; the only thing George could think of was the four-word sentence that he’d been repeating to himself since he’d left home – since before he’d left home. 

“I can't take this,” George said.

“Take what?”

Sapnap’s voice was soft. George breathed in deeply, but it was still stuttering and uneven. 

“This.”

The other man didn't speak, and George didn't look at him. He continued. 

“I can't take your kindness. I don't have anything to give you.”

“I’m not asking for anything,” Sapnap said, and George could hear him coming slightly closer through the water.

“I know, and that’s worse. I ain’t able to give you anything if I wanted to, even if you ain’t expecting it. I don't have the choice.”

“George – “

“I got nothing. I ain't even got a partner no more, no one to wonder with. You can't come with me since you got the mine, but I can't stay because I need to roam. I’m being selfish.”

“Says who?”

“I do, damnit!” 

George spun to look at him, waist deep in the cold water, and Sapnap’s dark eyes looked into his with a confused kind of indignation, like he was going to pick a fight with the injured man just to try and get him to see sense. Caught off guard by Sapnap’s expression, George took a step back. 

“George,” Sapnap’s voice was calm, “I am a damn man and if you were being selfish I'd tell you. You’re welcome to stay at my home for as long as you like, no guilt necessary, and ‘d kick you out if I didn’t want you there.”

Breathing deeply, his ribs aching but not with the break, George squeezed his eyes shut and felt too young. He wasn't young, not anymore, but the horrible feeling of being too small and too much like a small fish in a very wide ocean was monumental, and he flinched when Sapnap rested a hand on his left, unbruised arm. His skin was clammy from the water, but smooth and clean as he ran it up to George’s shoulder, and he finally made eye contact. 

“Stop looking sour,” Sapnap said, “and get yourself together. There’s only us here, no outsiders.” 

George looked at the hand Sapnap had on his arm, and then up at the man’s earnest face. He looked like there were things going on that George couldn't see, like he was trying to express it through actions alone and without words, but all he could do was let his mouth twitch downwards and place his hand atop Sapnap’s. It wasn't much, but it was enough. It just had to be enough.

George saddled Dew in silence, and he ignored Nimbus’ inquisitive glances towards him.

The sun was only just rising above the canyon walls, high above him and the two horses but taking its time in blushing the sky. The lingering clouds were fuchsia, the air was still cold from the desert night, and if he didn't know better then he’d expect more rain. He could feel the slightest of breezes coming from the entrance to Fort Rock and he adjusted his bandana to be higher on his neck. 

His skin was still damp from when he’d refreshed himself in the river, but with the day’s trek to Sanguine still playing heavily on his mind, along with the begging he’d have to give Sam when he turned up with no money and a different horse, he didn't want to stay too long. He didn’t have the money to bribe Schlatt with either, and so George thought about how the stay in Sanguine might need to be cut short.

George threw the saddle over Dew’s back, letting her adjust to the weight which had become unfamiliar in his few days away from riding her, and she shook out her mane as he went to adjust the stirrups. Before he could though, his eyes trailed to the man waiting in the doorway to the house. 

Sapnap had his arms crossed over his chest, and like he’d swallowed the cork on the bottle as well as the drink, George cleared his throat. 

“I need to leave,” George said, “eventually.”

Sapnap’s face didn't change.

“I know,” he said, “you cowboys sure do hold yourself to the desert.”

“I mean,” George sighed, his gaze flickering away and back to the saddle, “Soon. I need to leave soon.”

“In a week? Or what?” Sapnap asked, playing dumb to make George admit it. 

“Today.”

Sapnap was silent for a moment, and with George looking away from his face he couldn't read his expression, but he didn't move any closer or further away. For all intents and purposes, Sapnap was like a rock casting shade a short way from George’s side; a waiting respite that he refused to take. 

“Your ribs are still healing,” Sapnap told him.

“I know,” George told him, as if Sapnap wouldn't believe him.

“And what’s it for?” he asked, “just to get away from here?”

“I need to find Dream.”

“The guy that left you?”

George said nothing, feeling like he was eating sand. Sapnap sighed and took a step out of his home, letting the door slam shut behind him.

“It’s lonely out here by yourself,” he said.

He couldn't tell if Sapnap was referring to him or himself, so George just pulled his hat over his head and moved to put his few belongings on Dew’s back. 

“I won't be here much longer.”

“I will be.”

“I know.”

“It’s lonely out in the desert too,” he said, “wandering around with only a horse for company. Don't take this to heart George, but you seem like a fella who’s more interested in having someone to talk to.”

“I’m going to find Dream.”

“You think that’s a good idea?” Sapnap asked, and George looked at him.

“You don't know me.”

“We had five days together where you had nothing to do but play blackjack with me and talk. I know enough to tell you that if that son’bitch liked you he would have hauled you onto that train and saved you the trouble.”

“I told you, Dream probably wanted Dew to be safe.” 

“Then he’d be with Dew and you’d be out of these doldrums and in Gospel by now. Or I’ll do you one better – he’d be here too.”

George looked over at Sapnap again, although this time it was the other man’s turn to take a step back and look away. Sapnap knew that he’d crossed a line, one that neither man had wanted to cross, but it was obvious what they looked like. A pilgrim looking for their escape, and someone who had become hardened and apathetic in the desert winds. One who had never given up on the north star, and someone who had never looked to the sky in the first place. 

In an unexpected motion, George raised his hand, palm up, and gestured for Sapnap to come closer. 

It took a second, but the other man jerked into motion before George could think better of his action and lower it, and he walked across the sandy clearing towards where he was standing. Sapnap’s warm hand slid into his own colder, slimmer one, and he let them drop to their sides, still holding on to one another.

“Don't go,” Sapnap said softly, a near-silent movement of his mouth.

George’s face, still wearing the hat, was slightly below Sapnap’s as he moved ever so slightly closer, their breaths as close as condensation to a glass, and he tilted his head gently, the nervous glimmer of a question on his lip as it shook. He looked at Sapnap as he tilted his head back further, his neck coming out from the bandana and revealing a thin sliver of what pale skin he had left, and for the first time, he looked Sapnap in the eye for more than a brief, weighted second. He looked tired. 

“I’ll come back,” George whispered, and let their hands go. 

He took a step back, and with his bravery gone, mounted Dew’s back as she took a step forward, adjusting to his weight, but Sapnap moved forward to grab her reins before he could flee. In a fleeting moment, Sapnap used Dew’s reins and the stirrup George hadn't put his foot into yet to pull himself up.

“Kiss me you God-damned cowboy.”

George didn't hesitate. 

His ribs sent a flair of pain through his chest as he leaned forward and cupped the back of Sapnap’s head in his hand, and pressed his dry mouth to the other man’s. He could feel the brush of his stubble on his upper lip, raspy and hard compared to the soft skin below it, and George tilted his head to the side when Sapnap’s hand, the one not on the saddle to steady himself, came to George’s vest and pulled him closer. George’s hand on Sapnap’s head slid lower, to the back of his hot neck, and he pulled back slightly. 

They parted, with Sapnap lowering himself back to the ground and pulling his foot free from the stirrup, and George let his hand on Sapnap’s neck slide back onto his denim jeans. They looked at one another, and George didn't doubt that his face was a similar shade of red beneath his hat. That was the kind of thing men didn't do, but before George could kick Dew’s sides to get her moving, Sapnap spoke up again.

“I know you’re thinking and I don't like it.”

“And what’s that?” he couldn't help but ask.

“About what’s right and wrong. I want you to get a hold of yourself. Like I said before – there’s only us here, no outsiders.” 

George, against better judgement, let the corners of his mouth slide up in a smile.

“A wanderer is a wanderer,” he said quietly, and Sapnap let go of the reins. 

“Don't find Dream?” Sapnap asked of him. 

“I won't. I’ll come back.”

George did kick Dew into motion then, and her gentle canter moved him from side to side and made his ribs twitch slightly. But George paid it no mind – he refused to look back as he made his way through the overhanging canyon which had welcomed him to Fort Rock in the first place, minding his head in certain sections and refusing to falter, until he entered the bright light of the Calaway. He shifted on the saddle, moving on, but he looked back as soon as he was a decent distance from the crevice. 

Sapnap stood still in the rock, a pale shirt in the light which was watching him go, and George watched him until a sand dune disturbed their eye line. Sapnap was still there, waiting for him, even if he couldn’t see him.

George turned around, lowered his hat, and basked in the Arizona sunrise. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yooooooo, it's done!
> 
> Thank you to anyone who voted for this fic on my Twitter - I had a hard time deciding between this and another project, but I'm really pleased with how this turned out and I loved the process of this. Like I said, this work was something I'd wanted to make for a while, and I broke a lot of tropes I'd been relying on in writing it.
> 
> If you enjoyed this, please for the love of all things check out the song, 'Godless' by The Dandy Warhols, which inspired this fic. As I mentioned, the whole album is incredible and got me through some tough shit. 
> 
> On another note - did you notice what I did with the desert? I feel like a bit of a cheat saying this, but I really wanted this whole thing to seem like a purgatory, somewhere between death and heaven, which is the whole deal with Gospel being a thing. 'Gospel' also happens to be the last song on the album that 'Godless' came from - 'Thirteen Tales from urban Bohemia'. I really cannot stress how much I love that album. 
> 
> Let me know what you think! I love kudos, bookmarks, comments, everything! If you have questions I'll try to respond but I'm really bad at replying. Check out my twitter, which is the same as my ao3, if you want further updates or insight into what I'm writing next.
> 
> Thanks again!

**Author's Note:**

> I'm hoping to subvert a few of the tropes/themes I've noticed I've been relying on, so please bare with if this seems a bit weird at first 🤠 🤠  
> I've been wanting to write a western ever since I was like 13! I'm so excited for this fic, to the point where I stole the first line (the vulture) from a novel beginning I wrote when I was like 14. It's a little weird to think that I've had that in my head for so long, but hopefully it fits and it doesn't seem too out of place. This feels like a nice homage in some ways.  
> Just as a warning, too - there may be some unsavoury themes later on, including violence and either racism or homophobia. I'm obviously not going to go too far into those other two since both I and some readers may be sensitive to it, but since this is set in 1890's America, I feel like it's going to sink in regardless :/  
> But let me know what you think! I've been kind of struggling with this fic so far, partly because I feel like there's been a lot of exposition and not a lot of story development, but I also felt like this was a necessary thing. Since I am still in the process of writing this fic, I'd love to hear your thoughts! I adore reading through comments and whatnot, even if I dont always respond :) 
> 
> This fic was also inspired by my favourite album of all time: 'Thirteen Tales from Urban Bohemia' by the Dandy Warhols. Their first song in the album, 'godless', named this fic :) 
> 
> As always, please respect creators boundaries by not sending them this fic, and I will do the same in the event that they no longer want fanfiction or fan works. If it is ever declared incorrect to write shipping fics by the creators themselves this work will be deleted. Under no circumstance am I trying to insult or hurt anyone here.
> 
> Find me on Tumblr: @turtle-ier  
> Find me on Twitter: @Turtle_ier


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